


Matchmaking Wars: Stage 2

by eSinister Vortex (FanFicDotNetTransfers)



Series: Matchmaking Wars [2]
Category: Halo (Video Games) & Related Fandoms, Red vs. Blue
Genre: Gen, Machinima, Red vs. Blue-esque
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-08-19
Updated: 2012-04-06
Packaged: 2021-03-05 22:28:19
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 35
Words: 97,650
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25832785
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/FanFicDotNetTransfers/pseuds/eSinister%20Vortex
Summary: Continuing on from where MWS1 left off, the Greens explore the new universe in which they find themselves while the Yellows deal with the very real possibility of a Red Army attack on the Halothrii Wilderness.
Series: Matchmaking Wars [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1874341
Kudos: 1





	1. WHERE FUSION COILS COME FROM

**Author's Note:**

> Original story at https://www.fanfiction.net/s/7302656/1/Matchmaking-Wars-Stage-2

"…And that's the secret to faster than light travel," a fusion coil finished telling his son, a slightly smaller fusion coil, as together they watched the setting of the sun. "It really _is_ that simple."

"Wow, that's so awesome!" the child coil agreed enthusiastically.

From the field at the bottom of the canyon where they sat, both of them could see the sun set in the eastern part of the sky through spacing between the walls of a high plateau. They both admired the view in silence for some minutes.

Eventually, the child coil broke the silence. "Daddy?" he asked.

"Yes, son?" the adult coil responded.

"Where do fusion coils come from?"

The adult coil thought for a moment, as it was a rather complicated question. "Well, son, that is a very long story." He took a deep breath, which, as he was a fusion coil, made him glow slightly brighter for a time. Once his luminosity had returned to normal, he began:

"It all started when one of the fusion coil colony worlds, Reach, was destroyed by fearsome aliens called the plasma batteries. One ship, the Coil of Autumn, escaped by executing a random jump into the depths of space. They arrived randomly at a giant ring called a Halo. Their ship was attacked by the plasma batteries and The Coil of Autumn crashed on the ring shortly afterwards. To make a long story short, a really powerful fusion coil called the Fusion Chief, after realizing that Halo was a weapon that could obliterate the galaxy, detonated the Coil of Autumn and destroyed the ring – after escaping in a fighter, of course!"

"Why did the Fusion Chief destroy the ring instead of using it?" the child coil asked.

"The ring was controlled by an entity called 343 Guilty Nuclear Explosion. Shortly after meeting the Fusion Chief, they discovered that they had a few too many differences and 343 Guilty Nuclear Explosion tried to exterminate the Fusion Chief and detonate Halo prematurely. The Fusion Chief had no choice but to destroy the ring, or the galaxy would have been obliterated."

The child coil was almost sparking with interest now. "What happened next?"

"After the Fusion Chief returned to Earth and got a medal for the events at Halo, Earth was attacked by a very large fleet of plasma battery battle cruisers. The Fusion Chief discovered that a plasma battery leader, the Battery of Regret, was on the capitol ship and soon after the Battery of Regret tried to escape. The Fusion Chief and some friends, in the frigate In Fusion Clad, jumped after him in pursuit. They arrived at another Halo."

" _Another_ Halo? Wooooow!" the child coil shouted.

The adult coil continued:

"The Fusion Chief landed on the new Halo and found the location of the Battery of Regret in the center of a giant lake. And then the Battery of Regret exploded for no apparent reason. Or maybe it was because the Fusion Chief punched him. And the Fusion Chief was abducted by a giant blob of fat called the Grave Core, which was the hive mind for another race of aliens collectively known as the Mortal Coil.

While all of this was going on, a plasma battery called the R Biter, because he hated the letter R, became dissatisfied with the way that the leading batteries were handling their foreign policy and decided to lead a rebellion against the powers that were. Skipping a few chapters, he then stopped the second Halo ring from firing and saved all sentient life in the galaxy.

The Fusion Chief was teleported onto the plasma battery city High Voltage just as it was taken over by the Mortal Coil. The Chief stowed away on board an ancient ship along with the Battery of Truth, who let him stay on more of less just for the hell of it and because he had more important things to deal with than one Fusion Coil, as it escaped to Earth. The Chief left the ship before it landed, and then turned into an asteroid and landed in eastern Africa where he woke up as the Chief again, and then, with the help of the R Biter, helped retake Earth from the plasma batteries."

"Is that the end?" the child coils asked.

"No. The last part of the story is that the Chief traveled to a structure called the Park that controlled all seven of Halo and used it to blow up the galaxy because he was pissed off and then fusion coils in all colors that were orange fell from the sky and started an interplanetary civilization."

The child coil mulled this information around in his equivalent to a head for a while. "So then, is that really where we all came from?"

"Yeahhhhhh…no."

"Oh."

"Yeah, I just made that story up last night. Good, though, isn't it?"

"Well, where _do_ we come from, then?"

"Honestly…I have no freaking idea! I really don't."

"Hmm," the child coil mumbled in thought. "You really have no clue?"

"Not in the slightest," the adult coil responded. "We seem to just appear out of thin air most of the time."

"What about those bipedal things with visors?"

"What, you mean humans?"

"Yeah."

"I think they get here on starships or something like that. Appearing for no apparent reason seems to be limited only to our species."

"Yeah, well, I'd like to see one of those homen things-"

"Human," his father corrected.

"Right. I'd like to see one of those human things just appear out of thin air sometime. It would serve them right, for blowing us up all the time."

"Yeah, that would be worth seeing, wouldn't it?"

All of a sudden, an inter-dimensional portal opened up directly over the two coils. As they stared in awe, four green colored humans fell out of it. The coils barely had time to realize that they were in danger when the Greens impacted them, and they both exploded under the combined weight of four suits of Spartan armor.

* * *

The sun had not yet risen in the west when bagpipes started playing. Out of the entrance to the Yellow Base in Sector 18-Alpha stepped Patton, his reflective golden armor flecked with starlight as it refracted off of his armor's surface. Following him was Amber, who made sure that the pace of her steps matched exactly with those of her boss out of professionalism, and so that she wouldn't accidentally run into him. After Amber came Clair, who was humming in tune with the bagpipes, and taking to chance to scan the sky. And finally came Ryan, minus his helmet, who Patton had ordered to play the bagpipes. He actually had no real experience playing them, and so his notes were only rarely on key, more often than not barely played at all.

Before they had stepped outside, Patton had described his bag-piping skills as "chaotic but good enough for now" which, when translated, meant "You suck balls, but we're only gonna be doing this once, so I really don't care that much." Which was fine with Ryan, because he was extremely tired, having gotten only a few hours of sleep last night and none the night before, and having to deal with his boss's attitude was the last thing he needed right now.

Patton stopped the procession once they had gotten thirty meters from the entrance structure. Ryan stopped playing, thinking that his part was over, but as soon as he did his boss motioned for him to continue. Instead Ryan took the pipe from his mouth and asked: "Do we really need to do this? I _really_ don't like standing here without a helmet..." He squinted, his brown eyes attempting to pierce the darkness around him without his helmet's light amplification system.

Patton snorted and then said: "Yes. They were courageous people, and, despite being Green, they bravely fought alongside us. We must give them a proper funeral. That, and I just like a good breath of fresh air in the morning."

"Certainly makes me feel better." Clair added. "And there's a lot of medical info that backs it up..."

Ryan let out a complaining sigh. "But I don't like bagpipes. I've never liked that kind of music…if you can even call it that. Hell, I've never even _seen_ bagpipes before today! Where the crap did you get this pair?"

"Hobar?"

` "Yes?"

"How to say this…"

"Go on."

"I want you to shut up."

"Oh."

"You have the eulogy memorized?" Amber asked the commander.

Patton nodded. He walked up to the top of a nearby hill and took a deep breath. "We gather here today to mourn the passing of four of our greatest enemies-"

"I still don't understand why," Ryan rudely interrupted under his breath.

Amber and Clair shushed him forcefully. The weapons specialist crossed his arms and looked back at Patton, glowering.

The Yellow Commander continued: "And so we have all come here to honor the memory of those who would be heroes, except for the fact that they were technically our enemies, which is kind of disappointing, but fuck it, we're doing it anyways because we really don't have much of anything else to do. Firstly there was that loud crazy person named Kenny, whose mighty strength made up for more than his tiny, tiny brain. Then there was Skope, who was kind of a jerk, but seemed like a good friend of Amber's. Then there was that chick named Jess who I didn't really know, but I'm still kind of sad about her being dead just for the hell of it. She seemed nice, if a little dim. I'm sure she and Hobar would have been good friends. And finally, there was the strangest of them all, their medic Nome Achentat... Achentatensomething… LondonFranceParis…I think…wait, here we go...shit, I still don't know how to say that...ah, fuck it, I'll just call him the Medic. Anyways, last but not least there was the Medic, and boy was he one weird son of a bi-"

"Aren't we supposed to be honoring them?" Clair reminded. "I think that usually entails saying nice things about them. Not that I'm complaining, of course," she added quickly as Patton looked over his shoulder at her.

Patton sighed and shrugged. "Fine, I'll just wrap this up quick." He took in another breath. "They shall be missed, if not by us then by somebody…we should hope. Well, come to think of it, yeah, I guess we'll miss them. I mean, who else do we have to kill now other then the Blues?"

"Well, at least we've got LOTS of them!" Ryan put in, happy to have a subject other than bagpipes to talk about.

"Shut up, Hobar!" Patton ordered.

"Where do you go when you die?" Amber asked. "I mean, I know all that religious stuff, but still..."

Patton shrugged his shoulders. "Fuck if I know!"

"Well, wherever the Greens are, I'm sure they'll have lots of Blues to kill," said Clair. "That poor army has had so many casualties that the afterlife must be packed with them by now!"

"A heaven where all you do is kill Blues?" Ryan shouted excitedly. "Now, that's the life!"

"Unless Lucy killed them all already..." Patton muttered quietly to himself.

"You say something, boss?" Ryan asked.

"No. Nothing important. And why did you stop playing the bagpipes! Keep going until I tell you to stop!"

"Yes, sir." Ryan grumbled, before raising the bagpipes again.


	2. WE TELEPORTED N' STUFF

Skope shot up in surprise and shouted: "Oh my god, we ran out of Blues to kill! It's the end of the world! We can't kill any more Blues!" Then he looked at his surroundings and realized which reality he was in. "Oh, wait…it was a dream!" He let out a sigh of relief, then fell back onto the ground with a grunt. His vision was blurry, but slowly beginning to get better as he kept his eyes open. He cautiously got up and took a look at his new surroundings in more detail, propping himself up on the butt of his DMR.

"No, this can't be right." He muttered, looking around. "How did we end up here? Could this really be what it looks like? Where are we?" He was back in the canyon, next to his base entrance structure. His other three teammates lay around him, asleep…or so he hoped. He took a moment to bring up the TEAMBIO reading in his HUD. He'd been right; they were only asleep.

With that worry shoved away, Skope continued to scan his surroundings. He forced himself to his feet, looking down at the ground as he did. There were burn marks scorching the ground under where they lay, as if something had been impacted by them and exploded. Lending credibility to this theory was the small ring of debris scattered around them. No one seemed seriously hurt, fortunately, Skope included. Whatever it was, their energy shields must have absorbed all of the blast. Skope continued to look around the canyon, and had a distinct feeling of deja vu. The natural layout of the landscape was exactly the same as before, but he noticed a giant grey wall made of some kind of metal he'd never seen before off in the distance that cut off all passage to the shoreline that led towards where the Blue's had established their Kappa Base. _Okay, now that's a little bit strange_ , Skope thought _._ But it was the entrance structure, or rather what had taken its place, that held his attention.

Instead of the multi-floored building that he remembered, there was now a round circular structure that had only one floor, and a ramp in his direction that led up to the building's low roof, which was ringed by pillars. It looked almost like a giant bunker of some kind. Around the structure itself there were several vehicles. On Skope's side there were two Mongooses and some weird looking purple vehicle that didn't seem to have any wheels. On the other side of the bunker were three more vehicles: two Warthogs and another weird looking vehicle, except this one was much larger and rounder then the first one, and looked like it was built to carry two people.

 _Were there renovations while we were gone,_ Skope wondered. _I don't remember any of this!_

Skope was about to enter the bunker to see what was inside of it when he remembered that his teammates were still unconscious. He ran back over to them and called out loudly over the COM.

"Go away, I'm trying to sleep!" Jess groaned groggily in response, before rolling over onto her side.

"No, you need to get up!" Skope shouted again as he walked over to the communications specialist and shook her violently.

"Hey, what's so-" she looked around and realized where she was. "-Important?"

Skope left Jess to come to her senses and walked over to Nome and shook him as well. "Nome! C'mon, wake up, buddy!"

After a few shakes, Nome groaned: "Why do you awaken me at this hour? Has Private Ynnek gotten his head stuck down the rocket launcher barrel _again?"_

Skope shook his head. "No. But I need to ask you something: what's the last thing you remember?"

Nome perked up as he recalled the situation, raising himself on his elbows. "Hold a moment. The last thing I remember is falling into a dark abyss. So then, how did we end up here?" He looked around at the canyon, and his visor's gaze soon centered on their base. "And perhaps even more perplexing, what in the name of Hawking's Chair has happened to our base? The entrance structure would seem to have been replaced by an entirely different building."

"I don't know either," Skope answered. "But I really don't like it. Something very strange is going on here, and it gives me a bad feeling."

"Yes, this is all most curious," Nome mumbled to himself. "Most very curious."

Kenny groaned in half sleep: "No, the mushroom people are coming back. We have to stop them. They'll kill us all. I don't want to be molested to death by a giant mushroom. No, _no,_ NOOOOO!"

Nome kicked the distressed private to wake him up. He stopped screaming after a couple of seconds. "Oh, hey guys. What's up?" He said, easily snapping back into reality.

"Are you okay?" Jess asked him, concerned.

"Yeah, I was just having a bad dream again. About the giant man-eating mushrooms that molest you and then consume you. It usually happens when I sleep after having not slept for a long time. Oh, that's right! Last I remember, we got trapped on that platform and then started getting off by making another platform move with my awesome telekinesis powers, but then it didn't work and we fell into that black pit, and that's when my dream started. So how'd we all end up here?"

He rose to his feet as well and looked around. "And what the _hell_ did we do to our base? Did we all have a giant group acid trip or something and then redecorate the entrance structure into a bunker? I don't even like bunkers; they're so hard to make look awesome."

"Very defendable, though." Nome added.

"Well, I _hope_ that's not what happened," said Skope. "But I really don't have the slightest clue for what did happen, so I don't know."

"It doesn't seem like any of us knows what happened after we fell," commented Jess. "It's like we all just appeared here out of thin air."

"Hmmmmmmmmmmm," postulated Nome. "I have a theory. The Red named Steve was using that giant room with the platforms to generate an inter-dimensional portal, which I assume must have been the black abyss. Perhaps it worked by causing a rift in the fabric of space-time that decomposed us at a sub molecular level and then instantaneously reconstructed us in a different version of the same universe due to a very improbable outcome of Heisenberg's uncertainty principle."

"I understood you all the way up to the word 'theory'," Kenny commented. "Well, actually I guess I got to 'Steve', but after that everything just got too confusing."

"So, are you saying that we're actually in a different universe or something?" Jess asked. "That seems kind of sci-fi, don't you think?"

"Perhaps, yes. However, it would explain our current situation," Nome elaborated. "We are in a different universe, but it is extremely similar to our own, with only a few modifications. Possibly in direct correlation to the Butterfly Effect."

"Like how our base is now a bunker and the fact that we have six vehicles now instead of two," said Skope. "And two of them are purple."

"Indeed," replied Nome.

"I'm completely lost," said Kenny.

"Ah, but it is so simple," gloated Nome. "We are in a different dimension; that is to say: we are in the same universe, but changed slightly."

Kenny stared confused at Nome for some moments before asking: "So, we are and aren't in our own universe…at the same time?"

"Exactly."

"What the hell does that even _mean_?"

Nome took in a deep breath. "We are in an alternate outcome to our own universe."

Kenny turned to Skope and attempted to whisper to him: "Dude, I need your help."

Skope thought about what to say. Eventually he decided on: "When we fell, we got teleported from one place to another place. And this second place is similar, but a little different, from the first place. We are in the second place."

Kenny nodded, now beginning to understand. "So, we basically just teleported 'n stuff. Why didn't you just say so?"

Nome snorted.

Jess turned to Nome and asked him: "Okay, so if we teleported to here, then where _is_ here?"

"I do not know," Nome replied. "At least, not yet. I need more data to reach a better conclusion."

Jess crossed her arms. "So then, what do we do now?"

"Now, my good comrades, we acquire that data. Let us explore our new surroundings."

At that, the four of them turned and began walking towards the bunker to see what their base in this universe was like.

* * *

Back in the first universe, the sun now shone brightly down upon the canyon. Patton sat in the sniper post atop the Yellow's base entrance structure, eying Green Base through the detached scope of a sniper rifle, the scope having a higher zoom power than a set of binoculars or the built-in zoom in his helmet. Ryan was approaching him from behind. His bag piping duties having been completed some hours ago at the end of the funeral, the weapons specialist now wore on his helmet. He stopped just behind his commander and asked: "Hey, boss, what're you looking for?"

"Tangos," the Yellow Commander replied. "The Green Army always sends a replacement team to a Sector whenever one goes MIA. I am anticipating their arrival, so that I can stare at them from afar and become _acquainted_ with their weaknesses."

"Oh. So then, how long have you been out here?"

"Only about five minutes. I'm in a lazy mood. If the replacement squad doesn't show up soon I'm just gonna go inside and think up angry thoughts for when they _do_ get here! And maybe eat something. I'm kinda hungry."

"Sounds good. I think Clair's making lasagna tonight." Ryan rubbed his hands together, anticipating Clair's impressive cooking.

"Spectacular. Now let's just hope-" Patton paused, then swept the scope to his right.

"What's up, boss?" Ryan asked.

"They're here..." Patton muttered.

Ryan hurried forward. Sure enough, there was movement near the abandoned Green base. He squinted, trying to get a better look, but he could only just barely make out what was going on because it was taking place so far away. Patton, on the other hand, was able to witness it in exquisite detail.

* * *

A Warthog with three green colored passengers in it approached the Green's base entrance structure. It was followed by a Mongoose carrying only one passenger, its driver. The Warthog zoomed towards the base...and then right past it before the Green in the passenger seat called out, loud enough to by picked up by the audio sensors Patton had ordered placed at the base a day earlier: "Whoa, I think we passed it. Go back!"

The Warthog did a U turn that sent a huge spray of dirt into the air, and sped in the opposite direction. Again, the voice called out: "Now we passed it again! We need to go back. The building's right there! How can you miss something like that?" The Warthog did a second U turn and finally stopped in front of the entrance structure with a shudder. The Mongoose seemed to have a better sense of direction, as it had gotten to the structure a couple of seconds ahead of the Warthog (it was also slightly faster, being lighter), and the Warthog came in behind it, almost running into it as it came to a quick stop.

The driver of the Mongoose got out at the same time his three other teammates did from the Warthog. "What the hell was that all about?" he asked them.

The soldier from the Warthog's passenger seat, whose rank as CO was marked with thickened chest plates and no secondary color on his armor, approached the Mongoose driver cautiously. "What? Who in the flipping heck are you?"

The Mongoose driver was taken aback. " _Excuse_ me?"

The CO continued to stare at him.

The Mongoose driver elaborated: "I'm the new recruit. We just met like ten minutes ago, just before we left. How can you not remem-"

"Oh, right! Now I remember you!" the CO interrupted, clapping his hands together. You're Mr. Guy!"

"No, actually it's Kevin Guinness," the recruit replied.

"Really, are you sure? I remember you saying that your name is Mr. Guy."

"No, it's Kevin Guinness. Mr. Guy was the member I replaced, remember?"

"Oh, really? Well, carry on then, Mr. Kevin." The CO turned to face the other two people on the squad, but then turned back in Kevin's direction. "Actually, Mr. Kevin, let me introduce you to the squad."

"We've already met. Again, like ten minutes ago, just before driving here!"

The CO motioned to himself. "I, am Commander Ferrero Rocher, the Commanding Officer of this squad." He motioned to the soldier standing next to him. "And this is Sergeant Frisbee Rezah, my second in command."

As soon as Rocher had finished speaking, Rezah climbed on top of the Warthog's hood and stood there like a hood ornament in a proud pose, assault rifle held at parade readiness, while looking off towards the eastern canyon wall and called out: "Greetings, Private!"

"What is he doing?" Kevin asked.

"Posing," responded Rocher. "He does that a lot. Large ego, I'd guess." He shrugged, then motioned to the fourth member of the squad, a large chested soldier carrying a grenade launcher in his hands and a rocket launcher strapped onto his back. "And this is Mr. Boom. He's our weapons expert. We don't know his real name, because he doesn't talk, but he seems to like Mr. Boom well enough. All he ever really does is blow up stuff, and he's brilliant at it. Nice guy to have around when you're in a skirmish."

By this time, Rezah had gotten down from the Warthog's hood and was walking towards the base entrance structure. "I am in the process of entering the base!" he called back to Rocher.

"Good work!" Rocher called back to him. "Keep at it. Do not fail now."

Rezah had made it to the ramp. "Preparing to enter the base!" He made it up the walkway. "I am entering the base!" There was a metallic clang as he ran into something. "Hold! An elevator! Dammit, how do you work these damn things?"

"The up button, that calls it!" Rocher called back. "And then you have to enter the base's passcode."

"Right, I knew that!" He tapped some buttons. The sound of motors powering up became slowly audible as the elevator came up. At this point, Rocher, Kevin, and Mr. Boom had joined Reza at the elevator door. A second later the doors opened to reveal the elevator car. "Commander, I have called the elevator without fail."

"I knew you could do it!" Rocher commended while patting Rezah on the back. "With competence like this, we will be unstoppable!"

* * *

"I'm missing the original Greens already," Patton commented, still looking at the Green replacement team through the sniper scope. "These guys look so stupid that there won't be _any_ challenge!"

Ryan picked up his rocket launcher and began to load it. "Should we head over there and take them out now, sir? We could probably scavenge a couple days worth of ammo from them. Especially that Mr. Boom guy..."

Patton shook his head. "No, give them a night to get used to the Wilderness. They don't look like they've ever been here. If we're lucky, they might end up tearing themselves apart."

"Like those Greens in Sector 12-Delta." Ryan said, nodded in agreement.

"Exactly. And we have other matters to attend to. I just remembered, we should get around to interrogating the prisoner before we have food. The Blues offered to help out!"

Ryan just barely stopped himself from laughing out loud. "The Blues? Since when is it a good idea to have them help with _anything_ , let alone something important like an interrogation?"

Patton chuckled evilly. "I have the perfect plan for extracting information from the prisoner, just you watch…"

Ryan crossed his arms, trying to figure out what the Yellow Commander could possibly be thinking. "Wow, you haven't sounded this maniacal since you killed the mercenaries with that giant hammer on Yellow Command."

"Just meet me at the Blue Base entrance structure near the bridge remains in half an hour. Then, we will take the information we seek…" He almost let out an evil laugh as he said the last sentence.

Ryan shuddered under his armor and headed back into the base.


	3. THE INFORMATION WE SEEK

Patton and Ryan returned to the interior of their base to meet up with Amber and Brian, and then took the Falcon up to the Blue base near the bridge that stretched across the large gap in the mountains to the north of the Yellow and Green bases. There had been another Blue base that had been on the bridge itself at one point, but it had been all but obliterated by the Red Army about two and a half days earlier. In fact, the Yellows had journeyed there themselves less than a day later to investigate. And now they had come a second time, though only to fly over it as they journeyed to Brian's original base.

Looking up ahead to some tens of meters beyond the bridge crossing, Ryan could see the structure that must lead into Blue Base Iota. The building was tall, and looked to have two floors, not including the roof. Connecting the levels was an intricate ramp system that wove into itself a couple of times, and it looked like the only way to the roof was to step into some kind of gravity cannon, which sat at the top of the ramp spiral. He wondered why the Blues hadn't just settled for stairs.

Then he remembered: _Because they're Blues, of course!_

He turned to Patton. "Tell me again why you let the Blues hold onto the prisoner?" he asked him.

Patton sighed. "For once in their worthless lifetimes they actually helped us with something, by building that stupid ramp in the Red Base courtyard." He paused, thinking over the events of the last day or so, then added, "Well, actually it almost contributed to their near escape instead of their capture, but because it meant that their Warthog exploded in the air instead of on the ground, which was a brilliant tactical move. That, and it was way more awesome. So, I decided to indulge the Blues by letting them keep the prisoner for a very short time. And I don't know about you, but I'd rather not have a capable enemy like our "friend" down there in our base."

"Got that right," Ryan added quietly, thinking of the mayhem that the Red could have caused.

Patton nodded, then continued: "Don't worry, Sinclair's in there to keep them company; I sent her over here a few hours ago along with the Red, and she'll see through any stupidity that might allow the prisoner to escape. And the Blue's possession of the prisoner is only very temporary. As soon as we're done here, he's coming with us. Bradley wants to ask him some questions himself back at Command."

Ryan nodded. "I wasn't really that worried, but it still sounds like a good plan."

"Good. You're starting to trust my judgment, rookie. That's a good step."

 _Though I wish he_ _hadn't called_ _me "rookie"_ _,_ Ryan thought to himself. _I mean, I've been with the team for half a year now._

By now the Falcon was hovering directly over the Iota Base entrance structure, and Patton disabled the altitude lock to begin the VTOL aircraft's descent. As they started dropping, Brain clapped his hands together enthusiastically. "My home base!" he shouted. "It's been a couple days since I've been here. Boy, it's sure good to be back!"

"Just remember that you're still technically our prisoner," Amber reminded the Blue. "Yellow Command hasn't green lighted your defection. We're here on interrogation business only, not so that you can get reacquainted with your old friends."

Brian nodded. "Yes, that's right. I almost forgot. Over the last couple of days, you guys have been almost like family to me, so it's hard to know the difference."

Patton snorted loudly, the tone of his rude exhalation being mixed in with the thud of the Falcon as its skids made contact with the ground. Brian and the Yellows hopped out. A Blue soldier was walking towards them from the entrance structure. The Yellows walked towards him, and they met about halfway.

"Greetings," the Blue said in his helium high voice.

Patton nodded at him. "We have a prisoner to interrogate. Take us to him."

The Blue soldier crossed his arms. "Of course. Come. We wish to make you feel as comfortable as possible, and have tea set up for you in the common room."

"That won't be necessary," Patton declined. "Just show us the prisoner."

"Actually, I wouldn't mind some tea..." Amber muttered.

"Interrogate now, tea later." Patton ordered. Amber nodded and shut up.

The Blue soldier obliged Patton's order. "Of course. It's just this way."

He led the Yellows into the entrance structure. At the opposite end of the first floor was a separate room that held the elevator leading down into the base itself.

As they approached it, they passed several Blues sitting at a table and drinking tea. One of the Blues looked up at them. "Cherrio, ay Brian?" he said to Brian, holding his tea cup up in salute.

Brain almost jumped with enthusiasm. "Some Guy? Is that you? I thought your head exploded."

The Blue having tea shook his head. "No, that was my brother. I'm Some Dude."

Brian nodded. "Oh. Wait, now I remember you! And have you seen Jimmy Deargodman, by any chance? It's been awhile since I've seen him, and lately I've been captured by the Yellows and all…"

Some Guy shook his head. "I think he transferred to another base before I got here."

Brian sighed. "Oh, well. I would have liked to see him again. Oh well, It's been nice, but we have a Red to question!"

Some Guy nodded back at him. "Tallyho, me matey ol friend."

Brian joined the rest of his team. Ryan stopped and asked him: "Is that guy's name really Some Guy?"

"It's a nickname," answered Brian.

"And what was that last thing he said to you?"

The Blue escort soldier answered before Brian could: "I really have no idea. It's British accent week, but I'm not sure anyone really knows how to speak British. It's such a complicated language."

Patton stopped in his tracks and briefly considered shouting at everyone that British talk was the same language as English, but decided not to. It would slow things down, and the Blues probably wouldn't understand him anyways. He continued moving through the building.

Finally, they reached the elevator. Once they had all stepped in, the escort soldier tapped a button on the panel near the door, and the car began its descent. They had stood waiting for no more than three seconds when the lights died and the sound of alarm sirens made them all jump. With practiced speed the Yellows readied their weapons. The escort soldier stared at them confusedly.

"What are you doing?" he asked them.

"What the heck does it look like we're doing?" Amber shouted back at him. "An enemy attack is on!"

Brian shook his head. "No, it's not. That's the elevator music."

The Yellows stared at Brian.

"Elevator music?" Amber and Ryan said simultaniously.

"Explain," Patton commanded.

"The elevator music got switched with the sound of alarm sirens again. It happened all the time when I lived here. Mistakes happen, y'know? The wires for them look really, really similar..."

"Music, huh? _Really?"_ Ryan exclaimed.

The Yellows holstered their weapons. "I'll need remember to smack the Blue who messed this up on the back of the head before we leave here," Patton thought out loud to himself.

"Well, I was given the duty of installing the recording this morning," the escort soldier offered helpfully. "It might have been me."

Fifteen seconds and one brutal head-smack later, the elevator reached base level and everyone piled out of the car. "The prisoner is just up ahead," the escort soldier informed the Yellows while massaging the back of his head. Patton grunted and led the way.

Clair was waiting for them in the hallway as they stepped out. "Sir!" she called out to Patton to inform him of her presence, snapping a salute as she did.

Patton nodded back at her, but continued walking. "Sinclair, how's the prisoner?"

Clair fell into step with the rest of the group.

"Fine, far as I can tell. We've had him kept in the hold ever since you dropped us off earlier. He hasn't said much. For that matter, he hasn't really said anything at all yet. But that might be the sedative I gave him."

"Well, let's change that, then," responded Patton as he quickened his pace in the direction the escort soldier motioned. "Is he awake yet?"

"Yes sir. The sedative wore off about half an hour ago."

"Good."

They came to a cement walled chamber with only a single entrance, which the Yellows walked through. In the center of the room, sitting tied up in a chair, sat the prisoner. Steve, the former leader of the Red Team that had caused so much trouble recently. The instant Patton laid visor on the Red, he became slightly nervous, which did not happen often.

 _This is the guy who took out several Blue bases, a Green base, and almost took my team out as well. As if that isn't already enough, he supposedly defeated the Green Team single handedly,_ he thought to himself. _This bastard is quite the adversary, and not to be messed around with lightly._

Seeing the Yellows standing in front of him, the prisoner struggled to lift his head to look at them. "Ah, so you've returned," he gloated. His tone struck Patton as odd, seeing as the Red was in no place to be smug, or even be in a good mood. "Have you come to mock me? To torment the trophy of your victory?" Then he laughed. His maniacal outburst reverberated off of the walls of the chamber, magnifying the unsettlingness of it by many times. After some moments he quieted, then stopped trying to focus on the Yellows altogether, slumping his head again.

Patton felt a disturbing tingle run up his spine, but he covered his worry and cracked his knuckles. Now it was his turn to be threatening. He decided to go for the short-and-sweet style of interrogation; ask for everything, and if the prisoner didn't answer, resort to physical violence.

"Don't try moving," he shouted at the Red. "We took the liberty of shutting down the motor functions of your armor. Now, tell me everything you know about the Red Army! I want names, numbers of troops, tech locations, and attack plans!"

The Blue escort soldier cleared his throat. "Actually, we might've forgotten about the motor functions thing," he mentioned quietly.

Patton stiffened, and he slowly started reaching for his sidearm.

"I took care of it, sir," Clair said quickly. "And I locked a neural blocker into his armor. He couldn't move even if his armor was unlocked."

"Excellent," Patton responded relaxing. "I knew sending you over here along with the prisoner was a good idea."

Clair nodded proudly back at her commander while the escort soldier looked back at the prisoner, trying to silently remind himself that securing prisoners was the key to preventing their escape.

That was when the prisoner spoke again. "You cannot hope to stem the tide of our massive army!" he shouted, then lapsed into another bout of crazy laughter, hard enough to make the chair he was on shift around on the floor.

Patton unlimbered his shotgun and fired it off to the side of the prisoner to make him shut up. The sound of the pellet gun discharging echoed off the walls, making his ears ring slightly even through his helmet. "You will tell me about this army, or I will make you talk. Painfully!"

To emphasize his point, he pulled a shell from the ammo pouch on his waist and slid it into Lucy, but not before he "accidentally" let the Red see what was in it; White Phosphorous.

The Red started giggling again, despite the possibility of being doused in scorching chemical. "Well, there is that one platoon stationed at…"

"At where?" Patton asked. He aimed his shotgun to fire again, should the Red decide to continue his laughing fit.

"At Go Fuck Yourself Land!" the prisoner shouted. Then he started laughing, but only for an instant before Patton fired the White Phosphorous shot by his head to make him stop. The content of the round hit the wall behind the Red, causing the material to start to melt.

Patton bellowed: "Tell me! Taking longer to talk only makes things harder for you. Unless you really _love_ pain…"

The Red spit at Patton. Which would have been an impressive show of defiance...if he hadn't been wearing a helmet.

Patton chuckled. "Did you just spit in your visor?"

The Red took some seconds before replying: "Go fuck yourself."

Patton lowered his shotgun. "Fine, fine. You want to do things that hard way, that's what you get." He made for the door, motioning for the rest of his team to follow him.

Ryan, Amber, Clair, and the escort soldier followed Patton into the hallway to discover a squad of twelve Blue soldiers waiting for them, all of whom were packing rocket launchers. The squad's leader, identified as a Corporal by his armor, stepped up to Patton. "You told us to meet you here, and here we are. Is the prisoner talking?"

Patton shook his head. "He's all yours. Don't go easy on him. That's an order."

The captain nodded and led the way as all twelve soldiers marched into the small room. As they did so, Patton approached Ryan. "Hobar, I sure as hell hope you brought the popcorn, 'cause I'm SO gonna enjoy this!"

Ryan shook his head. "I forgot to tell you before we left the base; we're out."

Patton crossed his arms. "Out? Seriously?"

"Yup."

"When were we out?"

"Y'know that three ton cube of salt we had awhile ago?"

"Yes…Hobar, you aren't about to tell me that you ate all the popcorn again, are you?"

Ryan stared at his Commander, not knowing exactly how to respond.

Patton sighed. "Oh, well. We can do without it. Just sit back…" He then realized that his team was still in their armor "Or… _stand_ …in your armor, and enjoy the show."

At this point the last member of the platoon had entered the room. From outside, the Yellows could hear the Red call out: "What, you're going to torture me with Blues? This is the best you can do?"

He almost started laughing again when the captain called out: "Fire when ready!" and all twelve soldiers aimed their rocket launchers at the now very nervous prisoner.

The Red had time to call out: "Oh, shit!" before he was enveloped in the tremendous thunder of two dozen rockets going off in quick succession. The blast was so powerful it sent a wave of smoke and heat straight out the door, which almost managed to reach the area where the Yellows were standing. Over the noise could be heard a whaling cry that Patton would later describe as "screaming like a stupid little bitch", followed by what sounded like a small metal ball rolling around inside a tin can being dropped from low orbit.

"Isn't it _wonderful?"_ the Yellow Commander asked blissfully as the smoke cleared.

"Popcorn and a three and a half ton cube of salt would be really nice right about now," Ryan answered. Amber nodded in agreement.

Over the racket emitting from the hold, Clair mentioned to Amber: "You know, this very probably could be classified as cruel and unusual punishment, but I'm not sure I really care. I mean, I know I'm a medic and I swore that whole Hippocratic Oath thing, but that guy _was_ a jerk."

Amber nodded. "Yeah, don't feel too bad about it. He's just getting what he deserves. And honestly, this _is_ entertaining."

"As much as I hate to admit it, it is."

The noise from the hold lasted for a moment longer before finally dying down. The squad marched out of the room proudly, rocket launchers smoking. Patton nodded at them before motioning to his team to follow him back in. They found the Red somehow still sitting in his chair, looking mostly unharmed, except for the fact that he was shaking all over and his helmet had apparently been blown off during the cascade of rocket detonations. The wall behind him was what had really shown the difference. That is, it had been completely annihilated.

"Boss, how is the Red still alive?" Ryan asked Patton. "With that many 102 Mike Mike's going off at the same time, he should be lunch meat."

"Oh, it's really very simple," Patton explained. "I told the Blues to attack the prisoner. And so naturally, as all Blues can be expected to do, they missed completely, and instead attacked everything _around_ the prisoner. When I said I would torture him, I wasn't talking about physical pain. I was talking about the fear of 'oh shit twelve people are firing rockets at me' kind of pain."

Ryan nodded. "That's brilliant, if I do say so myself."

Patton nodded proudly. "I'm a savant at making people scream like little terrified girls. It's my specialty. Thank you Lemon Squadron training."

"So _that_ _'_ _s_ what you did with them," Clair said to herself.

"Actually, I was their pilot." Patton corrected. "But Intel Acquisition _was_ one of my secondary jobs."

None of the other Yellows replied, so Patton returned his attention to Steve.

The prisoner shakily asked: "Okay, I give. What do you guys want from me?"

"Like I said before, everything you know about the Red Army," Patton answered.

The Red gulped, and his face showed actual fear. "Okay, I'll tell you. Our army is just a couple days old, but we've increased our numbers rapidly since; it all started when we encountered-" He stopped, then said, more to himself than the Yellows, "No, I shouldn't speak their name."

"Who?" Patton asked.

The Red chuckled again, but not long enough to start another laughing fit. Apparently, he'd regained some of his original resolve. "We're coming. Remember that beacon I activated back at my base? It's calling the rest of us. It won't be long now; you don't stand a chance."

Patton raised his tone. "Where will the attack begin? Where will your army be coming from?"

"I don't know."

"Considering that I can bring the Blues back in here ASAP, that's not a very good answer as far as you're concerned."

"I really don't know!" the Red insisted. "I've been compromised, and so they've changed their tactics from the ones I knew. Even if I wanted to tell you, I couldn't."

Patton wanted to push the Red further to get more information, but he could tell that the Red spoke the truth: he had told them all he knew about the planned attack. He turned to his team. "We've gotten all we can out of him. This interrogation's over."

"So, what now, boss?" Amber asked.

"We take him back to base for rougher questioning," Patton answered. "I still want to know more about this 'person' they encountered who 'started all of this'. I'm quite sure Bradley and the boys at Command can think of something to get it out of him."

"Moving me again?" the prisoner asked. "I won't let you take me ali-"

Patton whacked him on the forehead with his shotgun, hard enough to draw blood, and the Red fell unconscious.

The Yellow Commander turned to the escort soldier. "Get us something to carry the prisoner in. A wheelbarrow or something of the sort should work. Nothing too fancy. He is a prisoner, after all."

The escort soldier nodded and left the room.

Patton then turned back to the Red. _This person you spoke of who supposedly started an army just days ago, who are they? And how is that possible? You will give me the information I seek, one way or another…_

He motioned to the rest of his team, and they headed back the Falcon.


	4. CHOCOLATE NAMESAKE

Kevin Guinness and his teammates were settling nicely into their new base. Conveniently, there had been four people occupying the base before they had come, and so there was just the right number of beds for everyone.

Rocher took the bedroom that was arguably the fanciest, which had everything neatly organized. The room even smelled of disinfectant, as though its former occupant had been obsessed with keeping all of his possessions (the very small amount of them) as sterile as possible. A notebook was sitting on the nightstand containing many hundreds of equations. "Wow," Roche commented out loud to himself while pouring through the tome.

 _The guy who had this room must've been some kind of mathematician,_ He thought to himself. _And judging from how mind numbingly clean everything in here is, probably OCD as well._

Sergeant Rezah's room had a pink and purple color style. The former occupant, obviously, had been a young woman. A poster with a gothic looking boy was on the wall at the far end of the room. The bottom of it read "TWILIGHT". Rezah was rather disturbed by the poster, as no matter where he was in the room, the gothic boys eyes seemed to be following him. After two minutes of this, he solved the problem by pasting a much more attractive poster over it; namely, a picture of himself, posing on the hood of a Warthog. On the nightstand was a diary, but Rezah couldn't open it because it was sealed with a combination lock, and considering that the book was obviously intended as private, he doubted the code to open it would be listed in the info packet for the base. He decided to leave it alone for now and use something from the groups bomb-disposal kit to force it open later.

Of the group of four, Mr. Boom was the most satisfied with his room, though of course he didn't say anything about it. His room was packed with various different guns, ranging from pistols to DMRs, and a rather worrying (for anyone other than Mr. Boom) amount of explosives, including some C-18, much to his surprise. He even found a full can of gasoline under the bed.

 _For a flamethrower, perhaps?_ He wondered.

The room's nightstand contained several picture books about _Ernie the Crustacean_ and _Mr. Ninja,_ which of course was far less interesting to Boom then the near armory of weapons the room also contained. Some additional reading material scattered around the room at almost random intervals consisted of numerous piles of comic books, enough to make a collector drool. Too bad Boom was no comic fan, or he would have been in hog's heaven. But then, he still did have lots of weaponry to keep him company…

Kevin was left with what was arguably the most franchise dedicated bedroom in the base. Its former occupant had apparently been a massive Star Wars fan, because nearly every nook and cranny of the 3 by 4 meter room was packed with Star Wars novels, mostly from the New Jedi Order Era onwards, though there were some from earlier on in the timeline as well. A poster of The Empire Strikes Back, signed by several of the actors, hung on the bedside wall, and on one the shelves were all six of the movies, arranged in numerical order. In the nightstand drawer, Kevin discovered several different types of laser sights, scopes, and the focusing lenses that went along with them. _These gizmos are the kinds of things that would fit on a sniper rifle. The guy who was here before me must've been the team's sniper, in that case…_

More digging supported this theory. Kevin quickly turned up a spare sniper rifle barrel, several empty magazines, and twelve boxes of 14.5mm ammunition to fill them with.

Once he was done setting his stuff up, Kevin went down to the kitchen to meet up with his other teammates. He found them gathered around the kitchen table, apparently waiting for him. As Kevin entered the room, Rocher called out: "Ah, so the slow new person is finally here. Now we can begin discussing our plans of action."

Kevin sighed in annoyance and took a position on Mr. Boom's side of the kitchen table with reluctance.

Rezah took his turn to speak, and in preparation for this he stood on top of the table and took a heroic stance. The table creaked under his weight, and Kevin scooted a bit further away from it in case it decided to give out.

"Some hours ago the Yellows were spotted entering a Blue base with a red colored prisoner. Now, for those of you who are still new to things around here…" He eyed Kevin as he said those words. "…The Reds are the ones who supposedly killed the former team who lived here. We need that prisoner. As of now we are anxiously awaiting the Yellow's return. The instant they do, we will set out and claim the prisoner."

Kevin cleared his throat to let the others know that he wanted to speak. "I still don't understand exactly how the former Greens died."

Rocher snorted. "It's perfectly simple. The Greens encountered the Reds, and the Reds killed them. What's to be confused about?"

Kevin elaborated: "But no bodies were ever recovered from Red Base. If the Greens are dead, then what happened to the bodies? Shouldn't they technically be considered MIA until we know for sure they're dead?"

"Mr. Guy, shut up. That's an order."

"My name is Kevin, actually."

"Shutting up means being quiet. Or are you so new that you don't even know that?"

Everything went silent. Rezah, still standing atop the table, stared down at everyone.

After some moments, Rocher told him: "I think your speech is done. You should probably get down now."

Rezah nodded and jumped down onto the floor, making a crash as his half ton of armor collided with the ground.

Rocher took a deep breath and continued: "Well, now that those distractions are out of the way, we can focus on the main matter. We must wait for the Yellows to return, and when they do, we will take the prisoner for our own!"

Mr. Boom left the table and checked the holoscreen showing the view from a camera he had placed outside before his team had gone inside that monitored the Yellow Base entrance structure.

"So what do we do while we wait?" Rezah asked, glancing over his teammate's shoulder.

Rocher pulled out some cards. "Poker, anyone?"

All of a sudden, Mr. Boom waved for everyone to come over. Through the magnified view, they could see a Falcon coming down to the entrance structure and dropping off four soldiers, one of them being the Red prisoner. Mr. Boom zoomed in on the Red to confirm his identity, then nodded in satisfaction.

Rezah walked back over to the poker deck. "A quick game, maybe?"

Rocher shook his head. "Prisoner now, poker later. Let's go!"

* * *

In the universe they had been sent too, the Greens cautiously entered the bunker, unsure of what they would find. They came into a low-ceilinged room with two wall-like pillars on either door side that forced the entryways into small hallways. These hallways led into the main room, which had an open skylight that took up the vast majority of the ceiling's area. Skope sprinted to the other side of the room, searching for the path down into the base's interior. The other three teammates fanned out as well with the same objective. Seconds later they regrouped.

"Far as I can tell, this is just a room with a skylight," Skope said.

"The entrance to the base might be hidden, like how we discovered the control center in the Avalanche Lab Complex," Jess suggested.

Nome shook his head. "Since our stay at the lab complex, I have trained myself to look for such details, but I could find nothing here. If the entrance is hidden, then this universe's version of us has developed a completely different method of concealment."

"Or it really is just a heavily fortified room...with an empty skylight," Kenny put in.

Nome hmmmmmmmed in deep thought.

All of a sudden, they heard a macho male voice say: "Slayer!" This was followed by a series of five beeps, like a five second timer counting down.

The Greens looked around in confusion. "What was that?" Skope asked.

"I don't see anyone," Jess said confusedly. "Where could that voice have come from?"

Nome stared out the skylight. "It sounded almost as though it came from all around us, because we all reacted at the same time." He glanced around looking for a speaker system or something that could have caused the voice. "Strange. Very strange indeed..."

Kenny suddenly went alert. "Guys, I hear movement outside."

Everyone else listened, and discovered that they could hear it too. Skope whispered: "Yup, lots of movement. From the shoreline."

As the Greens cautiously made their way towards the shoreline side exit, Kenny postulated: "Well, since it's just gonna be this universe's version of us outside, this shouldn't be much of a problem. Hell, this might even be fun! I could finally have a real conversation with myself!"

They made it outside to find the shoreline crowded with people. Eight people, to be exact. Every single one in red armor.

"Or perhaps the Red Army has taken over our base in this universe," Nome postulated.

"Okay," Kenny revised. "This might be a problem."

* * *

The Yellow's Falcon, piloted by Patton, sat on the ground just outside their base entrance structure while everyone else on his team, as well as the Red prisoner, piled out of it. "Why can't you just drop us off at the waterfall, again?" Ryan asked Patton while helping Amber hold onto Steve. "Weren't we going to take him to Command?"

"I've told you already," Patton sighed. "The Red is by far the most dangerous prisoner we've ever had at this base. If he somehow got loose on the Falcon while we were in the air, then it would be disastrous. We can't risk that. So, we need to drop him off at the nearest place possible, and that's this one. Then we can move him in some way that is much safer for us."

Ryan nodded. "Yeah, that makes sense."

"Just get the prisoner inside ASAP," Patton ordered. "We need him in a containment cell before he gets the chance to try anything."

"Yes, sir." Ryan nodded.

He and Amber dragged Steve through the door, and were followed shortly by Brian. Patton noticed that Clair was staring off in the direction of Green Base. "Sinclair, see something important?" he asked her.

"You might want to turn around, boss," she replied quietly. "We got company."

Patton turned to find the entire Green replacement team pulling up on the other side of the Falcon in a Warthog and a Mongoose. "Ah, what the hell do these morons want?" he grumbled to himself as he climbed out of the Falcon and approached them while pulling out his shotgun. He took a position next to Clair, resting his shotgun in his palm.

The Green in the Warthog's passenger seat climbed out. Patton thought that he was going to shake his hand or something, until he climbed on top of the Warthog's hood and took a heroic stance. The LRV groaned and sank onto its front wheels under the Green's weight.

 _I saw him do that when I spied on them this morning,_ Patton thought to himself. _What the hell does he think he's doing?_

 _"_ Okay, what the hell is this?" Clair wondered out loud. Patton smiled at the medic's accidental echoing of his thoughts.

"I bid you great tidings, oh leader of Yellow Team," the Green shouted at him.

"Um, hi," Patton replied, slightly confused. "Why are you here, and what the _heck_ are you doing to that Warthog?"

"That's actually a really good question," said the Green in the driver's seat of the Warthog, who, Patton could see by his armor, was the team's CO. "Why do you always do that whenever you say something?"

"I am using it as a stage from which to project myself," the Green on the 'Hog's hood replied.

"I apologize for him," the Green's CO said to Patton. "I think it has something to do with his ego, but I'm not really sure."

"Oh joy, now we get to deal with an egomaniac. Fucking perfect." Clair muttered.

The Green CO sighed and got out of the Warthog. "Sergeant, you can come down from there. I'll do the talking from here." He walked over to Patton, stopping a couple centimeters from the Yellow Commander's helmet and told him straight to his face: "I'll get right to the point: we have come for the prisoner, and we demand that you hand him over."

Patton just stood there for a few seconds like a statue, and then started snickering, all the while fighting the urge to use Lucy to enforce his "personal space".

"Do not snicker in my presence!" the CO shouted. "The Red is responsible for the deaths of the members of the previous Green Team in the sector, and we have a right to have custody over him!"

Patton continued to snicker, the sound slowly growing into an actual laugh.

"Do you know who we are?" the Green CO continued. "We are a specialized organization known only as the Fast Action Response Team!"

Patton stopped snickering as he heard the name.

"Wait..." He muttered, thinking the name over. "F...A...R...T-" He stopped as the name sunk in. "Oh, you have _got_ to be kidding me."

"We kid you in no such way!" The first Green put in from the Warthog's passenger seat, where he had climbed after getting off the hood. "We are the best of the best!"

"Yes! The F-A-R-T!"

"Silent and deadly!" The first green and the one on the Mongoose shouted out. Patton guessed this must be the group's motto.

Patton and Clair exchanged a look.

"You know your acronym spells "FART", don't you?" Clair asked them, too stunned to laugh.

"And their motto is 'silent and deadly.' For real." Patton added, just as stunned.

The two Yellow's exchanged another look, then doubled over laughing, Patton actually having to sling Clair over his shoulder to keep her from falling over.

The Green CO stared at the Yellows, clearly not amused. "If that is not enough to make you take the conversation seriously," he shouted, "Then allow me to introduce my team and myself!" He pointed at the Mongoose driver. "This is our rookie, Mr. Guy."

"It's Kevin Guinness, actually!" the driver shot back, directed more at his CO than the Yellows.

The Green CO ignored Kevin and pointed at the soldier on the Warthog's turret and continued: "This is Mr. Boom, our appropriately named weapons specialist." He then pointed to the ego-centrist in the passenger seat. "And this is my second in command, Sergeant Frisbee Rezah."

"Frisbee?" Patton wondered out loud. "Why in the hell were you named after a catch game toy?" he asked the sergeant.

"Shut up, I'm not done talking yet!" the Green's CO snapped before Rezah could answer. "Last and most, there is myself. I am the leader of this elite team, Commander Ferrero Rocher."

"Like the chocolate candy brand?" Clair asked suddenly. "I love those things!"

"What?" Rocher asked.

"Y'know, the chocolate candy. Kind of expensive as grocery store brand chocolates go, but taste like nirvana."

"Are you comparing me to a chocolate?"

Clair shook her head. "No, I'm just saying that your name is reminiscent of a chocolate brand that I love."

"Wait, is that the stuff you sprayed Ryan with anesthetic over?" Patton asked, suddenly remembering an event that had occurred in the base a couple months back. "The ones with the hazelnut cream filling?"

"Yeah. Why? I _said_ he shouldn't touch them, but he didn't listen..."

"I don't care about that. Hell, you should have hit him with something stronger. I was just wondering. But you're right; that stuff is _awesome_. I think I'll order some in our next supply drop."

"Really?" Clair's voice took on a hopeful tone. "That would be great!"

"Well, it's not like we really need anything else, and we have to order _something_ from Command..." Patton said modestly.

Rocher crossed his arms, unhappy that the conversation was turning towards something that didn't involve his mission. "I don't believe you. I've never heard of this brand of chocolate." He paused, thinking. "Then again, I hardly ever eat chocolate…"

"So then, your acronym really _is_ FART?" Patton interrupted. He and Clair started laughing again.

Rocher shook his fist at the Yellows. "You'll regret this!" he shouted at them. "I'll make you hand over the prisoner one way or another!" He then turned to his teammates and began walking towards his Warthog. "Come, we must depart. We will show the Yellows…in due time." He climbed in the Warthog and drove off, and the Mongoose trailed behind.

Patton and Clair watched them go with amusement, Patton again propping Clair up, which the girl didn't seem to mind at all.

"Well, that was an entertaining conversation," Patton said. "And it should have given Amber and Ryan enough time to get that Red secured. All in all, I'd call that a win for us."

"I'll say," the cook/mechanic/medic replied, using Patton's shoulder to push herself upright again. "Their CO seemed to think we'd be seeing each other again." She glanced up at Patton, trying to read her boss's emotions through his visor. "But you don't think they're really that big of a threat, do you?" She deduced.

Patton thought for a moment. "More so then the Blues before the truce, but then that's not saying very much. No, I'm much more concerned with the Red Army right now. We barely managed to deal with four of them, and the prisoner seems to think that a _whole army_ of them is on the way. We'll need reinforcements for _that_ , I'm quite sure."

Clair looked her commander straight in the visor. "That bad, huh?"

Patton nodded. "Possibly. I'll have a talk with Bradley about it when we take the prisoner up to Command. Hopefully he'll have some troops to spare." He hummed as he turned away to head back to the Falcon. "Hmm...I wonder if Lemon is still operational..." Clair heard him mutter.

With that conversation at its end, Clair went into the entrance structure to help secure the Red, and Patton got back into the Falcon so that he could dock it at the landing pad.


	5. HEMMORHAGE

The Greens stopped in their tracks as the eight Reds approached them.

"Don't move," Kenny advised. "Maybe they're like some of those animals I can't remember the name of that can't see anything unless it's moving."

"Um, I think you might be more than a little wrong," Skope whispered. "These guys are definitely human, and I don't think any humans are like that."

The Reds had now surrounded the Greens and formed a semicircle around them. All eight had their weapons raised. One Red turned to look at the other and said: "I didn't know this was Multi Team. I thought this was just a standard Slayer match."

"Yeah, who the hell are these guys?" the second Red said. "We're in Big Team Slayer. I mean, what other Slayer game variant has eight players on either side?"

"They could be hackers," a third Red postulated.

"Yeah, they have to be," two others agreed.

"And you all know what that means," the first Red said.

All the rest of the Reds nodded.

"Yup, we waste 'em." said a fourth.

They all turned to face the Greens, only to discover that they were no longer there. "Where the hell'd they go?" someone asked. Then they heard the sound of engines starting up. "Hey, they're taking our Warthogs!" another Red cried. "Stop them!"

While the Reds had been busy discussing what to do with the Greens, the Greens had gone back through the bunker entrance, come out the other side, and climbed into the two Warthogs. Skope drove one with Nome as the gunner, and Jess drove the other with Kenny as its gunner. Looking back, they could see the Reds running after them and shooting at them with their DMRs, but their shots were mainly going wide. Kenny could see one of them get into the larger weird looking vehicle. The instant he did so, it lurched off of the ground and started floating almost a half meter in the air on what looked like a cushion of blue light. "What the hell?" he mumbled to himself. To the others he called out: "Guys, you might want to look behind you!"

"I can see it!" Jess shouted while looking in the rear-view mirror. "I'm moving this thing as fast as it will go!"

The weird looking vehicle was not only floating, but moving towards them, fast. It appeared to be boosting, because blue jets of light came out behind it. The Warthogs sped towards the other end of the canyon and came upon another bunker, looking exactly the same as the first. But far more interesting was the fact that it was populated with eight blue colored soldiers.

"The Blues are here too, and in the Yellow's base?" Skope exclaimed. "Guys, are you seeing this?"

"Affirmative," Nome replied. "Some peculiar things must have happened in this universe for things to turn out the way that they have."

Apparently there was no truce in this universe either, because as the Greens neared the base, the Blues started shooting at them. By now, the floating vehicle controlled by the Red had nearly caught up with them. It suddenly disabled its boost, and they thought that it was going to give up the chase, until its cannon fired the absolute largest glob of what the Greens recognized as plasma that they had ever seen.

"Evade!" Jess shouted. Both Warthogs turned in separate directions to avoid the blast, and it impacted between them. They now came upon the vehicle layout for Blue Base. They drove through it more or less side by side. Everyone was shooting at the Greens at this point: most of the Blues and the Red in the weird looking vehicle. Nome fired at them from his turret, and managed to kill one of the Blues. But as fast as his vehicle was being driven, several of his targets were only nicked by bullets, their energy shields preventing any of them from doing any real damage. Four of these Blues managed to slip past the Green's turrets unharmed, climbed into their two Warthogs, and then began to pursue the Greens.

Looking back at them all while on the turret, Kenny was almost ready to except defeat. That was when things got even more interesting; the Red vehicle fired at one of the Blue Warthogs. The first hit, surprisingly, didn't destroy it, but on the second hit the LRV exploded. That left the other Blue Warthog. It and the Red vehicle fought it out while the Greens cleared as much distance from them as possible.

"So then, the Reds and Blues are on opposing sides here too," Skope commented. "That's good. At least we don't have all sixteen of them united against us."

"Fifteen," Nome corrected. "I killed one of the Blues."

"Sure, that makes everything so much better," Kenny retorted sarcastically. "We're still outnumbered!"

"Actually, we are now outnumbered by a ratio of 15 to 4, which as you notice is not easy to simplify, and according to Morgan's Law of Real Life Mathematics-"

"Question is, how do we get out of here?" Jess asked, cutting Nome off before he could finish. "There's a giant wall blocking the way to the shoreline, and I don't see any air vehicles, so we can't get over the cliffs."

"And trying to climb them would just get us shot." Skope added.

"We would appear to be trapped," Nome concluded. "Even so, I believe our best course of action is to kill the enemy, and then, once we are no longer fighting for our lives, take stock of the situation."

"Kill everything. I like that plan!" Kenny exclaimed. "It's always worked for us before!"

"We've already gotten rid of one of the Blues, so I think we should head back over there and finish the others," Skope suggested.

"Though the Blues are surprisingly competent in this universe," Nome commented. "If we were in our universe, then I could have killed ten of them at least when we were over there the first time."

"Even so, we've got a lot more killing to do," Kenny put in. "So let's get back over there and let 'em have it!"

"Um, guys?" Jess exclaimed nervously.

"Yeah?" the other three answered in near unison.

"I think the Blues have found _us._ "

Everyone looked behind them, and sure enough, the small army of Blue people was approaching them on a series of vehicles, including one that none of the Greens had noticed before, an oddly shaped violet colored vehicle, floating like the Red's strange vehicle. Its size vastly dwarfed that of the Red vehicle however, and Nome had a sneaking suspicion that it was the reason the Red vehicle had not come to join the fight as well. The other vehicles continued to speed towards them, but the large vehicle stopped.

Then, to the Green's horror, it launched a giant blue ball of plasma the size of a small car in their direction.

Kenny screamed the word "Evade!" at the top of his lungs, but the reflexes of Jess and Skope were already an instant ahead of him. They moved just in time, and the blast impacted not a meter behind them. The splash damage sent both vehicles spinning end over end.

Nome calculated that the odds of them surviving a vehicular accident such as this was no larger than 7.2 percent. However, after spiraling several times both vehicles landed right side up. Nome looked at the other Warthog, and to his astonishment, no one seemed to be hurt. Most of the blast had been absorbed by their armor's shields.

 _That is incredibly improbable,_ he thought to himself. _It is as though the laws of physics in this universe have been tweaked slightly to allow for such incidents to happen. Perhaps this universe is more divergent from ours than we thought..._

That was when the medic noticed something even more strange: the Blue army assaulting them consisted of _eight_ soldiers. _But that cannot be correct,_ he reminisced. _There were eight soldiers to begin with, and I killed one of them._ He could even see the soldier he had killed, who was the passenger on a Mongoose riding towards them: he had the exact same armor permutations. _How can this be?_

"Guys!" Skope shouted. "We need to take out that plasma tank!"

"No shit," Kenny noted. "But how the hell are we going to do that? That thing's got some serious armor on it!"

"We need to get behind it," Jess recommended. "It can't be that armored back there, or it'd be too damn slow to be tactically useful. But in order to do that…"

"We need to stage a diversion," Nome finished.

"I like maiming stuff," Kenny said. "I'll do it!"

"Fine, we can be the bait," Jess groaned. "It was my idea anyways."

"Then it is decided," Nome stated. "Let us carry this out."

By now, the Blue vehicles had nearly reached the Greens. Without further pause, the Greens split up, with Jess and Kenny heading straight towards the tank thing, and Skope and Nome taking a much less obvious path in order to get behind it.

As Jess's Warthog neared the tank thing, it launched another plasma blast at her. Instinctively, she drove out of the way, this time making sure to be far enough from the impact so as not to be affected by the blast's splash damage. While this was going on, Kenny fired his turret at the head of the tank, which had begun to buckle slightly under the sustained fire despite its apparently heavy armor.

Meanwhile, Skope and Nome approached the tank from behind. Nome began to fire upon it with his turret, scoring a long series of direct hits on its weak rear armor, but then gained a better idea. "Lieutenant Skope, take me to the very back of the vehicle," he instructed.

Skope had very little idea of what Nome was planning, but if there was one thing he had learned from the short time he'd been with Nome, it was that when the medic had idea, it was in everyone's best interest to do it, and without hesitation he took the Warthog closer. The tank thing was still preoccupied with Jess and Kenny, and had no idea that the other two Greens were behind it. The instant Skope's Warthog came within range, Nome hopped off of the turret and climbed onto the back of the tank.

"Nome, what the hell are you doing?" Skope shouted at him.

But Nome knew exactly what he was doing. From his tool belt he pulled off a fragmentation grenade, pulled the pin, and then shoved it into a large hole with twin rings of light spinning in opposite direction just above his head, which he knew must lead straight into whatever passed for an engine on the vehicle.

Now, Skope knew exactly what Nome had been planning. The medic hopped off of the tank thing, sprinting away from it, and an instant later it exploded in a rage of fiery blue plasma as the grenade set off its engine.

"That was brilliant!" Skope called over to Nome.

Diligently, Nome climbed back onto the machine gun turret, and Skope brought the Warthog over to reconvene with Jess and Kenny, who had broken away when the tank exploded.

"I wanna do that next time!" Kenny shouted over to Nome. "That was awesome!"

"You may yet have the chance," Nome said calmly, as if he hadn't just blown up a tank with a grenade. "The enemy's support is down, but there are still many other of their threats to take care of. Come, for we have much combat remaining."

All of a sudden, the Greens heard the rumble of engines from the other side of the canyon. They looked to find the entire Red army coming to meet them. And that wasn't all: from the other direction, all remaining Blue vehicles were preparing to rush the Greens as well.

"Guys, it's been nice knowing you," Skope nervously notified his teammates.

The Red vehicles reached the Greens...then kept on going and instead directly engaged the Blue army. The Greens stated at the scene in disbelief. "Are the Reds fighting for us all of a sudden?" Jess wondered aloud.

Since the Blues had already been weakened by the loss of their violet colored tank thing, it did not take long for the full army of Reds to drive them from the center of the canyon. The battle was fierce but short lived. Ammunition of all sizes flew through the air, intermixed with grenades. The Reds didn't even lose any of their personnel, though this was due mainly to the fact that the Blues abandoned the scene so quickly. Once the Blues had fully retreated, the Reds approached the Greens. Nome and Kenny swung their turrets around to focus on them.

A soldier climbed out of one of the Warthogs and walked up to Skope's Warthog. "Hi," he said in a friendly tone, apparently unconcerned that there were a pair of .50 caliber light anti-aircraft guns aimed at him.

Not really knowing what to do with the fact that a member of a terrorist army was greeting him, all Skope could think of to respond with was: "Um, hi."

"'Sup?" the Red continued. "I'm French Panda. Um, your GamerTag doesn't seem to be showing when I look at you. Must be a glitch or something. So, what _is_ it?"

In light of the fact that Skope was clearly mystified as to how to deal with the conversation, Nome decided to carry it on in his stead. "Greetings, French Panda," Nome called out. "I am First Class Medic Nome Achentaughtensheloem Londontokyoparis."

" _That's_ your profile name?" French Panda shot back. "Shit, what the hell were you doing when you were signing up for Live, having a seizure or something?"

"Excuse me?" Nome interjected.

"Look, I think we're getting off on the wrong track," French Panda said apologetically. "What I meant to say was: that was some pretty damn good teamwork you guys pulled off back there. Wanna join our team?"

"Ummmm," Kenny thought out loud. "You're the Red Army. You guys tried to kill us not so long ago."

"Red Army?" French Panda laughed. Behind him, several of the other Red's joined in. "What the hell are you talking about?"

"I dunno. What the hell are you talking about?" Kenny shot back automatically.

Another Red soldier walked up behind French Panda. "We are the Clan of the Caged Watermelon!" he shouted at Kenny, an amazing amount of pride in his voice.

"A clan?" Kenny asked. "You mean, you're not an army trying to take over the Halothrii Wilderness?"

"The say what now? Halo 3 Wilderness?" the second soldier said. "Whatever. No, we identify ourselves with the Caged Watermelon, because caged animals are always the most dangerous."

"And we are the most dangerous of all!" The rest of the Reds howled in unison.

"But, a watermelon is a fruit, not an animal," Jess corrected quietly.

"Shut up," the second soldier barked. "Ah, but I'm being rude. Standard Live chatter, right? Now let me introduce me and my team. I am the leader of this clan, Exuberant Ned." He then motioned to everyone else. "You have already met French Panda, my second in command. The other six members are I Eat DMRs for Breakfast, Angry Wet Sock, Penguin Love Party 1990, Supreme Commander Mike, Boot With Ass Intent, and The Cake Is Truth."

"And I thought Nome's name was weird!" Skope muttered under his breath.

Bluntly, Nome asked them: "What do you want form us?"

"Ah, but we've already told you that," Exuberant Ned informed him. "We want you to join us. Your fighting skills could come in real handy. And I hear that there's going to be an even bigger match coming up, and we could use four more people."

"Before we join anything, I want to know what exactly is going on," Skope demanded, glaring at Exuberant Ned. "How did you end up in this canyon? Why are the two of your teams fighting each other? And what do you want us to do about it?"

"This canyon is called Hemorrhage," Exuberant Ned explained. "It's one of the built in maps for Reach." He paused, then added "Wow, you guys are really new to this game, aren't you?"

"I guess you could say that," Skope responded, not exactly sure what else to say. "So then, if you guys aren't an interplanetary army vying for control of this world, then what's with the battle just now?"

Exuberant Ned sighed. "Wow, have you _never_ played Live before? Shit. Well, I'll make this simple: you guys are in something called Matchmaking. It's basically an online system that hooks players up to fight against each other in various settings, which we call 'maps.'"

"Hmmmmmm," Nome said. "But would that not result in massive loss of life?"

Exuberant Ned shook his head. "No, no! In Halo Matchmaking you have more than one life. Unless you're playing a Custom Game with a set limit of lives, but no one likes playing those. You can do it as many times as you want, but even so you don't want to die. That's the way teams in Slayer score: by getting a certain number of kills from the other team."

"I killed a soldier from the Blue Team, but then saw him again, fully alive, only a minute later" Nome stated. "Are you saying that in this universe, death means nothing?"

Exuberant Ned laughed. "Yeah, I guess you could put it like that. In Halo, dying and then coming back to life is called respawning. Whenever you die, you wait a few seconds, and then come back at certain places called spawn points."

"This universe is truly remarkable," Nome postulated. "I wonder if this "respawn" would apply to us."

French Panda put in: "So anyways, we want you guys to join us. Friends?" He held out his hand to Skope. Reluctantly, Skope shook it.

Without warning, the same macho voice that the Greens had heard earlier spoke again: "Team change!" But that was not all; as Skope watched, his armor instantly changed color, from green to red! He jolted out of surprise.

"Dude, that's way far out!" he heard Kenny cry. He looked, and sure enough, his armor was red colored as well. The same was true for Jess and Nome.

Noticing their surprised expressions, Exuberant Ned commented: "You guys act like you've never switched teams before." Then he remembered that they were new to the game, and revised: "Oh, right. Of course you haven't. Man, what the hell were you playing before this? Wii?"

Nome spoke, ignoring the last part of Ned's comment: "It is indeed good that we have composed an alliance, but there is one further matter that concerns us: how we leave the canyon."

Exuberant Ned sighed. "Look, I told you already: the only way to leave a map is by ending the game, and the only way that happens is if one team or the other wins."

"Or if they go to the in-game menu and-" French Panda put in.

"Shut up!" Exuberant Ned interrupted. "Don't tell them that. We need them!"

"Right, sorry!" French Panda apologized quickly.

Exuberant Ned turned back to the Greens. "Before we continue with the battle, we first need to tell you a little more about what's going on. You see, this isn't just any matchmaking game. What's happening right now is something called a Clan War. That is when two or more clans decide to fight it out to determine which is more skilled. The winner also gets prizes and bragging rights, so you can see why we'd rather like to win."

"And who, if I may ask, is the Clan of the Blue Team?" Nome inquired. "I wish know who we will be fighting."

"They are the Clan of the Pissed-Off Raspberry," Exuberant Ned stated. "And a few days ago we _really_ pissed them off. But that's a story that we can talk about after this game. For now, we need to focus on beating these guys!"

Kenny started snickering. "These names are hilarious!"

"So, how to we win?" Skope asked Exuberant Ned.

"For the Big Team Slayer game variant, we just have to score 100 kills on the other team before they can do the same for us."

"And since you guys got two kills, and we got three from that confrontation a few minutes ago…" French Panda started.

"…We have 95 kills to go," Exuberant Ned finished.

"That's terrific!" Jess exclaimed sarcastically. "Just fucking great!"

"Looks like we've got some work to do," French Panda said. "So let's get to it."

With that, everyone mounted up into vehicles or started out on foot and prepared to bring it to the Clan of the Pissed-Off Raspberry.


	6. OFFICIALLY YELLOW

The sun began to fall behind the eastern canyon wall, creating a large shadow over the canyon itself. Through the approaching darkness, the Yellow's Falcon flew determinedly towards the teleporter leading to Yellow Command, running lights coming on to illuminate the gloom. The portal sat in the ruins of a Blue base that had been unknowingly built next to it and destroyed by the Yellows three days before to prevent even the slightest chance of breaching Command. Patton shared fond memories, along with his teammates, as he took the Falcon over the wreckage which still littered the area. Ironically, the very VTOL craft they were flying had originally been attached to the Blues stationed here before the Yellow's had stolen it from them. Some seconds later, he came upon the location of the teleporter, and he set it down in front. Then he got out of the air vehicle, readied his shotgun, and aimed it at the passenger compartment of the Falcon. Coming out of the open sides were Amber, Ryan, and Steve, the latter being dragged on account of the neural jammer still on his neck. Steve looked around as much as he could at the scene of destruction that was now all remaining of that Blue base. "Nice work," he sarcastically complimented. "Love how you wrecked the place. Of course, I could've done an even better job of it." He chuckled.

"Shut up, Red," Patton warned, while aiming Lucy more precisely at Steve's head and following while Amber and Ryan moved him to a position closer to the teleporter. He glared at the prisoner and gripped his shotgun's grip hard enough to make it flex slightly in an attempt to relieve some of the stress he was currently under.

Next out of the Falcon came Clair. She was followed by the main object that had resulted in Patton's state of heightened agitation: Brian. Patton was aware that having a Blue and a Red in the same Falcon while it was being piloted by Yellows was risky business, but he needed to get Command to authorize Brian to join his team, because if Steve was right then a Red army was coming to invade, and Yellow Team would need all the help it could get. While Brian wasn't the best soldier ever, he had intel on his army...and if there was one thing Patton knew, it was that any intel was useful.

Since Amber and Ryan were busy watching the Red, and Patton had to keep an eye on both the Red and the Blue, the Yellow Commander ordered: "Sinclair, activate the teleporter, would you?"

The medic/mechanic/cook nodded and strode over to the teleporter. Remembering the process from her first trip to Command, she tapped a small section of the teleporter frame on the right side. A small device popped out, which emitted a red laser which scanned the Yellows from head to foot. When it was finished, it popped back into the frame, and a green light on the top center of the frame lit up. A column of green light ignited in the center of the structure. Clair turned back to her boss and saluted.

"Done, sir," she reported. After that, she stepped into the teleporter and vanished.

Amber and Ryan, forcing the Red to go with them, entered the teleporter next. Just to make sure he didn't forget to go in (and to keep an eye on him), Patton had the Blue got before him, and then stepped in himself.

He reappeared next to his teammates, who were slightly disoriented from the transfer. "It's the second time I've done that, but I'm still far from used to it," Amber commented.

"You'll be eventually," Patton reassured her. "Though some of that is just that we've been through the teleporter twice in a week. You really aren't supposed to do that. It's in our safety regs."

Clair straightened when he mentioned the regulations regarding the teleporter.

"What are the regs exactly?" she asked. Patton paused, thinking, then replied.

"You aren't supposed to go through a teleporter more than five times in one week." He said. "Minimum safe time for multiple trips is supposedly 16 hours, but I don't trust that. Sergeant Morris went through twice in 18 hours, and he almost lost a toe."

"Almost?" Clair asked, voice quite. "What happened?"

"Oh, it disappeared during transport," Patton replied, surprisingly calm considering the subject. "But someone found it. Ended up in some port pilot's morning cereal..."

"Right..." Clair turned away. Patton turned as well, to his left, to discover that Brain was wobbling uncontrollably.

"Whoaaa, that was really cool." His wobbling caused him to do a near 180, and he saw through the force field that he was in space. "Ooooh myyy God, we're in space! Spaaace!" He clutched at his helmet and sank to his knees, twitching and gibbering. He calmed down after a moment. "But I can't see my base from here. Awwww!"

He tried to stop wobbling, but had trouble. Clair walked over to him and grabbed his shoulders to steady him.

"Bro?" Patton heard a familiar voice call. He turned to find Bradley and an escort soldier waiting for him.

"Bro!" he greeted. They fist bumped, then twisted their arms down to allow for a sort of one-armed hug, just as they had done when they had last seen each other.

When they were done, Bradley said: "I heard you would be coming, and that you have a prisoner. Never a shortage of those with you around, is there?" He motioned to the Red. "This would be him, I assume?"

Patton nodded. "Yeah, that's the bastard. He's pretty dangerous. You should get him secure ASAP."

Bradley nodded. "Will do." He hit a button on his tacpad, and a squad of four soldiers came to escort the Red to an interrogation cell.

"Where do you want him, sir?" one asked.

"Detention Level Omega," Bradley ordered. "In one of the airlock cells, please. And rig it for emergency venting."

The soldiers nodded and, taking the Red from Amber and Ryan, carried him deeper into the station.

As he was being led away, the Red called back to Patton: "Wonderful place you've got here. It will be sooo fun to ruin it." Then he broke into his characteristic crazy laughter that echoed long after he was out of sight.

"Don't listen to anything he says," Patton advised Bradley, as both watched the hall where the prisoner had gone. "He does that a lot. In fact, during just the couple of hours we kept him at our base, he described no less than five fantasies about what he wanted to do to us and our base."

"Such as?"

"They mostly centered around brutally injuring us and/or painting us red. Oh, and setting us on fire and using us to roast marshmallows."

"I see. Bizzare," Bradley noted.

"Yeah. Strange character. Anyways, there's some things we need to discuss in private. Well, with my team, since it does concern them."

Bradley nodded. "Sure thing, bro. We can talk in m office." He motioned for them to follow him. He led them much the same way they had come on their first stay. After some minutes, they ended up in the station control room. Viewscreens on all walls showed tactical data on the entirety of the planet down below. As the Yellows filed in, Bradley slowly turned to face them. He tapped a button on the console, and an electrical noise stirred the air. One of the screens near them blinked "COUNTER ELECTRONICS PACKAGE ACTIVE."

Bradley crossed his arms and looked at the group. "Now then, to business."

Patton nodded. "Yes, to business. The first thing to discuss is simple. An entire army is planning to invade the Halothrii Wilderness."

He said it calmly, as if saying that it was going to rain later that day.

"Yes, I heard," Bradley informed. "You did destroy their established base here, though, is that correct?"

Patton again nodded. "Correct. We got their scout base. Just before he was captured, the lead Red, Steve, the guy who we handed over to you, said something about a 'beacon to warn the others'. I can only assume that that meant signaling more of his forces to come in."

"Did the Red say anything about when the others would arrive?"

Patton shook his head. "Negative. Well, except that it will be soon. But that's all we, and he apparently, know."

Bradley tilted his head in confusion as he said his latest sentence. "How can the Red not know?"

"He mentioned that as soon as he was compromised, his army would know to change tactics, thus rendering his intel useless to us."

"So we at least know they have good tactical sense." Bradley said.

"Yeah. It always annoys me whenever the enemy is that smart." Patton agreed.

Bradley crossed his arms in a way that made him seem almost exactly like Patton for a moment. "I'd say this requires reinforcements."

"That's one of the main reasons why we're here," Patton agreed. "I do hope you've got some to spare."

"Indeed I do," Bradley confirmed. Even under his helmet, the Yellows could tell he was smiling. "And I think you'll find them to be familiar."

Seeming to know what Bradley was going to say, Patton looked him in the eye through his visor. "So then, they _are_ still operational." He practically whispered as he said that sentence, though it could not contain the nostalgic excitement in his voice.

Bradley nodded. "And as luck would have it, they just finished with a mission on the other side of the system. I'll send for them. They should be at your base within the next 36 hours or so, if we included debriefing time."

Patton nodded satisfactorily and sighed. "It's been so long. Yeah, it'll be good to see them again."

By this point, Ryan's curiosity had nearly peaked to its full strength. "It sounds real nice, boss, but… _who're_ you talking about, exactly?"

Patton turned to his heavy weapons specialist.

"Lemon Squadron."

If Ryan's visor hadn't been on, his companions would have noticed that his jaw had dropped considerably. "No..."

"Yes." Patton replied.

" _The_ Lemon Squadron? The best spec ops team in the entire Yellow Army?"

"The very same."

"Whoa." Ryan leaned against the wall of the room and took a deep breath. "Wow, we must really need help if they're our reinforcements!" He paused, remembering something from a minute earlier. "Wait, you said 'see them again'... did you meet them before?"

"Met them?" Patton laughed, more of a cough than an actual noise of humor. "Hell, I was their pilot for a year and a half."

Ryan fell silent for a full minute.

"You were actually _in_ Lemon Squadron? Dude, that's awesome! Why'd you never tell me?"

"Need to know basis," Patton responded matter-of-factly. "And you never really needed to know." He paused, then added more to himself than the rest of the group, "Besides, the past is the past…"

As he said this, he gripped his shotgun, running his hand along the name carefully carved into the butt; Lucy.

Ryan turned to Amber and Clair.

"Did you guys know this?" He asked, still sounding shocked.

Both girls nodded.

"Hard not to know everything about a person when you have access to their medical files," Clair explained. "And I think Amber actually met him before she joined us..."

"Yeah, during Basic," Amber filled in. "They had Lemon come in to do a demonstration." She paused, then looked at her CO. "I'm not really surprised he didn't tell you. He doesn't like to talk about it."

Clair nodded in agreement.

"As I said, _the past is the past…_ " Patton said again. There was an edge in his voice, a sourness in his words that made it clear he didn't want to discuss the topic any more.

From Patton's last line, Ryan could tell that his leave of the squadron hadn't been on a good note, but this only served to heighten his interest. He would have asked more on the subject if Bradley hadn't got there first with another: "So then, there was something else you wanted to talk about, yes?"

Patton remembered, changing subjects eagerly: "Ah, yes. The Blue." He motioned to Brain, and Bradley began sternly looking the Blue over. "I believe I told you about him over COMs this morning. He's been with us now for, oh, about two days now, and has actually been kind of useful of late. A good distraction for the enemy, if nothing else. That, and it's just good to have one more member on my team."

Bradley nodded. "I think I remember him. He's the Blue you took with you here before, is he not? The one Private Hobar was guarding when the Browns attacked?"

"Yes, this is him," Patton answered. "The special thing about this one is that, unlike any other Blue I've seen before, he survives in combat. He's been in three battles that I've seen so far, and he's outlived three dozen of his fellows. And I'm talking battles, not skirmishes. He was there with us when we took down the Red's base."

Bradley continued to look Brian over, but this time with a tinge of confusion. "That is quite a find. Very peculiar, especially since he's a Blue. Still, a soldier of his caliber should definitely be in our army. With some proper training, he could become an immensely useful asset." He turned back to Patton. "But has his defection from the Blue Army been approved yet?"

"No." Patton shook his head. "Which is one reason why we're here. We haven't had time until now make his addition to our army official."

"Well, we can take care of that easily," Bradley confirmed. "What's the Blue's name?"

Brain responded: "I'm Brian! Nice to meet you, Yellow leader guy!"

Bradley nodded at the Blue, then walked over to a control console hit a few buttons, and turned back to the Yellows. "It's done." He stated.

"Well, that was fast." Ryan commented.

Bradley shrugged. "It's a very simple process, really."

"I figured it would have required a lot more paperwork," Clair noted. Bradley chuckled, the same laugh that Patton did.

"One of the perks of being Lord High Commander General. Anyways, he's in our army now."

Brian jumped enthusiastically. "I'm officially yellow?" he loudly asked.

Bradley nodded.

"I'm officially yellow!" Brain shouted in declaration. "This is so awesome!"

He started to run around the room, pumping his fists in the air and screaming.

"Um, just how much coffee did he have before coming here?" Bradley asked Patton, eying the spasming Blue.

Patton sighed. "Ah, he's just like that. You get used to it after a while." Moving back to the first subject, Patton asked: "Well now that that's taken care of, when do you plan to interrogate the Red?"

"Whenever you want," Bradley responded. "He's waiting in an interrogation cell now. We could have a trained interrogator do the job, if you like."

Patton shook his head. "No, I'll do it. That, and you still have that hammer here, right?"

"The Gravity Hammer? Yes, it's still in the testing center. Why?"

"Well, I noticed it had a setting on it labeled 'Interrogate'..."

"Ah, or course. I'll have it sent up to you."

"Marvelous." Patton rubbed his hands in anticipation. "I've been waiting to do a _real_ interrogation since we captured the bastard."

"With the help of my ramp," Brain put in.

Patton was about to shout at him: " _Shut up, Blue!_ " But then he remembered that Brain was now a Yellow, so he instead he just put his glove on Brain's shoulder to make his stop jumping, which he had been continuing to do even while they had been talking. He turned back to Bradley. "I'll give my team some time to get set up here. We won't be here long, but I don't know how long it might take to crack the Red. I'll be there for the interrogation in, say..."

He glanced over at Clair, a silent request to the medic for her opinion on how long the group should have a break for.

"Three hours." he repeated.

Bradley nodded. "See you then, bro." He turned from them back towards the screens and removed the counter electronics package.

Patton turned to his team. "You heard me. Find your quarters, take some free time, then meet me at the interrogation chambers at..." He glanced at his suit's clock. It read 1800 hours. Deciding that three hours would be long enough, he finished: "2100 hours."

Brian, Ryan, Amber, and Clair nodded before to filing out of the room.


	7. MATCHMAKING WARS

Exuberant Ned led the charge as the Red Team (some of which used to be Green) sped towards the Blue base. As they approached, they could see that the Blues were still recuperating from the recent confrontation. While all of them had respawned by this point, most of their vehicles had not. Realizing that the Blues were mostly grounded, Nome figured that this assault would near certainly be more effective then the last one, if for no other reason then the advantage of vehicles. As things turned out, he figured more correctly then he could have imagined.

When the Blues saw that the Reds were coming in full force, they scattered in all directions, all team coherency deteriorating into an "every-man-for-himself" mindset. And so, the killing began. The next few minutes consisted of the Red's vehicles circling the Blue's base in counter-rotating circles, killing everyone. The Reds were coordinated enough (with the instruction of Nome and Exuberant Ned) that they could circle the base and prevent the Blues from getting very far from it before killing them and easily avoid any retaliatory fire. This meant that even after the Blue's vehicles respawned, they could no longer reach them. Furthermore, it gave the Reds more of an advantage, because now they had access to the Blue's vehicles instead of just their own, and several Reds who had previously been on foot promptly climbed aboard them.

As the moments passed, the former Greens began to forget that these Blues were anything different from the Blues from their original universe; their deaths and rate of death were becoming very similar. In fact, it wasn't until French Panda informed the former Greens that they had only twenty kills to go that they realized exactly how fast the Blues were dying. "Y'know guys, this is really kind of sad on their part," he elaborated. "This whole thing has become so one sided that there's not really any challenge any more."

"Yes, it is indeed quite underwhelming," Nome commented. "Though I am mildly glad that we did not run into stiffer opposition."

"Speaking of, you guys still haven't told us how you got into fighting with the Clan of the Pissed-Off Raspberry in the first place," Skope stated. "Since all we're really doing right now is just driving around killing people, wouldn't this be good time to tell us?"

"It's actually really simple," Exuberant Ned answered nonchalantly, sliding the Warthog he was driving into a group of Blues who had attempted to exit the base. "I yoinked their leader."

"You did what?" Kenny asked.

"I yoinked him," Exuberant Ned repeated. He paused and then said: "Oh, right! You guys are still new to the game. You don't know what that is yet. See, in the game there are these certain types of finishing moves called assassinations. They don't happen that often, and when you do get them it's pretty gratifying for just that reason. But if someone else kills your enemy while you're in the middle of assassinating them, which is possible, then they get credit for the kill and you get nothing. That's called yoinking someone. And no one likes to be yoinked."

"And so, you stole an assassination from the Clan of the Pissed-Off Raspberry's leader?" Jess asked.

"Yup," was Exuberant Ned's response. "It was an accident. It happened in Multi Team. Very chaotic playlist, I have to say. I was trying to snipe someone, and he started to assassinate him before I could kill him. On instinct, I fired and killed the guy, and he got yoinked. I really didn't expect him to take it that personally when it happened, but the next thing I know he's declaring war on us in the post-game lobby. And there you have our conflict."

"Just one kill left to go now!" French Panda informed everyone. As he said this, a rebellious Blue poked his head out of one of the base's entrances. A salvo from Kenny's rocket launcher finished him in the next instant.

Immediately, the macho voice they had heard before returned.

"Game Over!" it bellowed. That was when everything went black. The former Greens could now see nothing but each other. The Blues and the Reds had disappeared.

"Whoa, what's going on now?" Kenny exclaimed confusedly, swinging around in an attempt to get his bearings.

That was when a colorful data table appeared in front of them. It contained the names of all players in the match and the number of kills they had individually gotten during it. The Blues all had zeroes, since they hadn't gotten any kills. The top windows showed the total scores for each team: 100 for the Reds and 0 for the Blues.

Nome seemed particularly satisfied with the numbers. "One hundred to zero," he muttered proudly. "A _perfect_ victory. Absolutely flawless. It is…magnificent!"

"Um, yeah, I guess," Skope commented, clearly not as ecstatic as Nome over the subject.

After a few seconds, the scene switched again, and the former Greens came to a list of the players of the last match. A timer counted down on the left side of the screen. Apparently it was some sort of temporary chat room, because voices could be heard from some of the player icons. The player who must have led the Clan of the Pissed-Off Raspberry, named I Gave You Raspberries, said "Damn, how did you guys do that? We got no kills. Fuck! Okay, Clan of the Caged Watermelon, look…when I said I was declaring war on you, I meant nothing personal."

"Aha!" Exuberant Ned shouted. "So then, you surrender!"

"Fuck!" I Gave You Raspberries swore. "Yes, fine, I surrender!"

Exited cheering erupted from the Clan of the Caged Watermelon.

"We showed them!" French Panda exclaimed.

The Clan of the Pissed-Off Raspberry left the lobby in shame, which caused the Clan of the Caged Watermelon to cheer even louder, enough that whatever they were using to communicate wasn't able to pick it up as anything but static. To the former Greens, Exuberant Ned said: "Guys, I've never had a game like that before. That was awesome. Thanks."

"You're welcome, I guess," Skope replied. "So now that the Clan of the Pissed-Off Raspberry is taken care of, now what? We still need to get back to our own universe."

"Um, I still don't really know what you're talking about," Exuberant Ned answered. "How about you play with us for a little longer?"

"I don't think they know how to get us back," Nome whispered to Skope.

Managing to overhear them, Jess asked: "Well, what do we do, then?"

Nome sighed. "I am afraid that our only choice for now is that we continue playing games with the Clan of the Caged Watermelon, and hope that one of the maps we come across has a portal leading back to our universe."

After thinking for a few moments, Skope decided that Nome was right. "Yeah," he whispered back. "Let's just hope we don't end up playing games for the rest of our lives doing this."

To the rest of the Clan of the Caged Watermelon, Nome said: "Yes, we shall continue playing…for however long it takes to find our way back to our reality."

"Great," said Exuberant Ned. "What playlist should we do now, then?"

"I think we should do Action Sack," Penguin Love Party 1990 suggested. "It's been a while since we did that."

"Good point," Exuberant Ned said. "We'll do that."

"Action sack?" Kenny asked. "What's that?"

"Action Sack is many things," The Cake Is Truth wisely answered. "It is chaotic. It is insane. It is stupid. It is funny. And, it is way fucking awesome."

"Let's try it," Skope suggested. "Chaotic, perhaps. But it can't possibly be more chaotic then the battle we just fought…can it?"

Exuberant Ned laughed.

* * *

Back in the first universe, the Green Replacement Team was still busy watching the Yellow's base entrance structure, as it had been doing ever since their talk with Patton roughly five hours ago.

"The Yellows've been gone for a long time and still aren't back yet," Sergeant Rezah informed Rocher. "If we intend to strike, then the time is now."

"I agree," Rocher confirmed. "Those foolish Yellows thought not to give us the prisoner, and now they will regret it. If they will so absent-mindedly leave their base open to us, then we will storm it and claim the prisoner by force!" He tapped his COM. "Mr. Boom, Mr. Guy. Prepare for battle. It is time to claim the prisoner."

Over the COM, Kevin groaned. "Are you sure the prisoner is still even in their base? What if they took him with them to wherever they were going?"

"Mr. Guy-"

"Kevin Guinness."

"Do not contradict your superior officer!" Rocher shot back. "Now then, as I was saying…if I wanted your input on the situation, then I would ask. Seeing as I did not, please just shut up. You will spend the next twenty minutes preparing for the coming battle, and you will do so because those are your orders and for no other reason. Am I clear?"

"…Yessir," Kevin grunted. He couldn't really think of anything else to say.

After deactivating his COM, Rocher rubbed his hands together in thoughtful anticipation. "Soon, we will have the prisoner, and then the Yellows will have learned their place!" After closing that sentence, he briefly considered laughing maniacally, but chose not to because he wasn't that good at it, and it wasn't really his style.


	8. THE HAMMER RETURNS

At exactly 2100 hours, Patton met with Bradley in the interrogation chamber, the same one he'd grilled the captured Brown in almost two days earlier. He nodded at the Yellow Commander as he walked over.

"Ready for some fun?" he asked. Bradley nodded.

"Oh yeah. But, before you start with the Hammer, you should know that we've never actually tested its interrogation setting. It might be a little finicky."

"That's fine," Patton replied casually, cracking his knuckles. "I always like trying out new things."

Bradley nodded and motioned the door to the interrogation room nearest them. "The Red, and corresponding Hammer, are waiting for you in that room. They're all yours."

Patton nodded and went through the door. Steve lay flat on the floor in the room's center, prevented from getting up because of the neural jammer around his neck. On one side of the room sat the instrument of this session: The Hammer, in all of its glory. Patton walked over and picked it up, slapping the handle into his hands a couple times.

"Haven't we already agreed that I've told you everything I know?" Steve asked, voice slightly muffled by the floor he was laying on.

"That was the introduction part," Patton answered slowly, referring to their first interrogation session at Blue Base Iota. "This…is the fun part."

"You really hate me don't you?" Steve asked. It wasn't so much a question as a statement.

Patton shook his head. "No, I don't hate you. But the Hammer…oh yes, it _does_ hate you."

"Damn right I do!" The Hammer said, voice provided Patton and his helmet's built-in speaker system down to almost sub-sonic levels. Steve jerked, shocked that the supposedly inanimate object was speaking it's hatred of him. Just as Patton had hoped.

The Red took in a deep breath. "Look…Patton…when I said I wanted to set your team on fire and use you to roast marshmallows, I meant it in a non-offensive way."

"Is that so?" Patton asked, voice full of mock curiosity. "And here I thought you were dead serious."

The Red did his best attempt at nodding. "I was trying to get acquainted. Like a hand shake, just a little bit ruder. I'm not a bad guy, I'm really not. You gotta believe me!"

Patton nodded. Sarcastically, he said: "Oh, I believe you." He then flipped on the INTERROGATION switch on the Hammer, lowering its energy output to a non-lethal (but still brutal) level. "The question is…does the _Hammer_ believe you?"

He pointed at the Hammer as he mentioned it.

"I've told you all I know!" Steve stammered.

"Hmmm...what do you think, Hammer?" Patton asked.

 _"He's lying."_ Patton answered his own question, again in the Hammer's voice.

"Well then, let's make him tell the truth, shall we?"

The Red screamed as Patton drove the Hammer to the ground. The Red's movements after this point can best be described as those of a ping pong ball. The force of the Hammer's burst of gravitational energy sent Steve airborne, and he bounced all over the room in a fashion that made a high velocity beach ball in zero gravity look uneventful. Patton had to duck several times to avoid being impacted by the flying, screaming Red as he went from wall to wall. Finally, after several moments of this, the Red ran out of kinetic energy and crashed to the floor in an exhausted heap, once again facing down.

Patton took the Red in his hands and turned him face up none to gently. "Now, I have some more questions. You willing to answer?"

Steve simply looked wide eyed through his visor at Patton.

"I'll take that as a yes, then. So, who is this person you told me about earlier?" Patton asked.

Still recuperating mentally from what had just happened, the Red uneasily attempted to focus, but shaking and a swift punch to the face from Patton eventually provided the motivation necessary to start him speaking: "What person?"

"The person who you said is responsible for starting your army in just days."

"Oh, that person. If you could really call them a person-" Steve decided he was giving away too much and stopped himself.

"Tell me…" Patton growled, slowly reaching for the Hammer.

"You wouldn't believe me, even if I did tell you. I'm not sure I even believe it myself." Steve gasped out.

"The hell is that supposed to mean?"

"I think it would be better if I just showed you. You see, what happened to me…when I encountered this person, they bestowed upon me certain…abilities, and I've never really been able to grasp them, but now I must try. I must show you. I _just_ need to get my focus back…" Steve rambled on, almost as if he hadn't heard Patton's question.

Patton readied the Hammer for another strike. "More of your twisted fantasies won't help you. The marshmallow thing, especially, is getting really old."

The Red did not respond. It was almost as though he was concentrating. _This isn't the time for daydreaming,_ Patton thought. He was about to strike with the Hammer…but it seemed stuck in the air. He let go of it, and instead of dropping to the floor, it simply floated. Patton tried to move it, but to no success. It was stuck.

That was when the Hammer moved of its own accord. With no one holding it, it prepared to strike…at him! Instinctively, Patton dove out of the way. The Hammer flew harmlessly over his head, missing the top of his helmet by a mere centimeter, and collided with the back wall, hitting it with enough force to dent the metal. Picking himself up off the ground, Patton looked back at Steve…only to see that he was getting up as well. Which wouldn't be surprising...except that the neural jammer was still around his neck.

 _It's telekinesis, it has to be,_ Patton realized. _That jammer shut down his body, but his mind is still working._

He had only read about it in science fiction novels, and always considered it to be the stuff of fantasy, but clearly it was happening now as well. Through the sudden confusion that filled his mind, Patton had one clear thought; he had to get out of the room ASAP.

Without hesitation, Patton made for the door, practically ripping it off its mounting.

Bradley greeted him as he hastily rushed through the door. "Bro, what's happening? I've been watching on the cameras, and-"

"I never thought I'd hear myself saying this," Patton responded, "But the Red's got some form of psychic powers or something. He just made the Hammer float by itself, and I just saw him float his ass right off the floor. Call security, hell, get a fucking VTOL squadron down here! We have to deal with this-"

Patton's fear-induced rant was cut off as he looked around. Already, he could hear alert sirens blaring throughout the station, and could see that soldiers were rushing in to deal with the situation. Bradley must have signaled them using his tacpad as soon as he saw on the cameras what the Red was doing.

For a moment, Patton felt his fear and confusion dissolve, and anger fill its place. He yanked his shotgun off his back, where he'd placed it before going into the room, and readied himself to fight.

It turned out to be a moot plan. All of a sudden there was a tremendous boom, and the interrogation room the Red was housed in exploded as if someone had detonated a full ton of shaped explosive behind it. The overpressure wave from the blast was powerful enough to knock several of the soldiers closest to the room a good dozen meters away. Everyone still standing (Patton and Bradley included) dove to the ground as pieces of wall flew everywhere. Patton looked up as he dust cleared, and saw the Red floating above the ground. The Hammer resided beside him in the air.

An ominous moment passed, and then the Red spoke: "Yes…now, at last, I understand…this is the power I was given. And it is…magnificent! Ahahahahahahaaaaa!" The Red's laugh echoed much more than it should have.

 _A telekinetic Red is loose on the station,_ Patton thought to himself. _Can this possibly get any worse?_ He climbed to his feet, retreived Lucy from her place on the ground where he'd dropped her when he hit the deck, and let loose with several shells, but the buckshot in the bursts seemed to deflect around the Red instead of going into him.

 _Oh, well_ this _is just fucking great,_ Patton thought angrily. _Now how the hell am I supposed to kill him?_ Patton may have been at a loss for options, but Bradley, with an entire space station and a full-fledged army at his command, had far more resources to use to bring the situation under his control…and he intended to use them.

Steve quickly shed the neural jammer, but continued to float. He quickly left the interrogation warehouse, moved into the central hallway, and floated towards the teleporter leading off of the station. But the press of one button on Bradley's tacpad sounded a specific alarm and put an entire platoon of Yellow soldiers in the Red's path. With another evil laugh, Steve brought the Hammer down upon them. Fortunately the Hammer's INTERIGATION setting was still activated, and so the blows were not fatal, but they were still enough to send Yellows and their gear flying in all directions, leaving Steve's path clear again.

"That's _my_ Hammer!" Bradley shouted after the Red. "Come back with that! Do you have any idea how expensive that thing is?"

Steve laughed in response, but that small distraction was not enough to slow his approach to the teleporter.

However, something else was.

Steve had gone only a meter further when a rocket impacted directly under him, a flower of yellow and orange flame blossoming into being in a second. With a surprised cry, Steve flew out of the air and landed painfully on the ground, shoved aside by the 102mm HEAT rounds overpressure wave. Patton and Bradley ran as fast as they could to catch up to the Red. As they approached, Patton turned to see the owner of the rocket that had knocked the Red down; Ryan, standing on one of the upper catwalks of the hallway, his rocket launcher perched proudly on his shoulder with smoke curling from one of the barrels. The weapons specialist nodded at Patton as he began his hasty descent to help secure the prisoner.

The Red was standing now, and waving his hands at the Yellows. "No, no!" he shouted. "My focus has been ruined! I can't use my powers unless I have perfect focus!" He lowered his hands, and, with little else to do, he screamed a curse at the Yellows and began running faster than Patton had ever seen anyone run before towards the teleporter.

"Stop him!" Patton shouted at the top of his lungs.

Many other Yellow soldiers were on the scene, and began to open fire on the Red. Bullets, buckshot, and even rockets and grenades hit the ground all around Steve, but he didn't flinch. By this time, Patton was almost upon him, shotgun ready to finish him off as soon as he grabbed the bastard. With now just a meter between them, he lunged at the Red, but to no avail. The Red passed through the portal, and it closed an instant later, leaving Patton to end his lunge by hitting the durasteel wall behind the teleporter node with a _crash_ of armor.

"Control, get me the location of the drop point of that teleporter ASAP!" Bradley shouted into his COM.

"Negative," came the reply. "The Red somehow used the teleporter to get to a place that's not on any of our records. Wherever he went, we have no way of knowing where that is.

"Can we blind connect to wherever it is he went?"

"No, sir. We can't get any signals, even from our own nodes. I think he scrambled the system somehow. I'm sorry, sir. There's nothing we can do."

Bradley's manner deflated like a balloon. "It's over. We lost him." He punched the wall angrily. "Dammit!"

Amber, Clair, and Ryan had now reached Patton and Bradley's location, the former two in partial armor. Amber's chest plate, shoulder pads, and helmet were missing, and Clair's entire right side and head were bare of all armor. From the looks of it, both had been doing maintenance on their equipment when Bradley sounded the alarm.

"That was far out!" Ryan exclaimed, excitement overcoming most of his other emotions. "Who could've guessed the Red was telekinetic?"

"I've never seen anything like that before," Clair observed. "His mind must be…a marvel! I'd love to run some tests on him."

"Oh, you'll have time to do tests..." Patton growled, picking himself up from the floor. "And when you do, I want you do a _lot_ of them on him. Especially unnecessary ones."

"That's when we get him," Amber noted sourly. "I saw what he did to your shots, boss. It'll be tough to headshot a person who can move a bullet."

"I wonder if he's a Force user," Ryan continued, ignoring his teammates conversation. "Probably a Sith, considering his armor color, and his temperament-"

"HOBAR!" Patton shouted. It came out more angrily than he intended, as he was still frustrated over his failure to prevent the Red's escape, and not a little embarrassed about how stupid Steve have made him look trying to catch him. "This is not the time for one of your Star Wars references!"

"But he has to be a Force user!" Ryan persisted. "You just saw. There's no other way he could've moved objects like that!"

"Hobar," Patton managed to repeat a bit more quietly, "I am ordering you to shut up."

Knowing better then to disagree, Ryan nodded at his commander and fell silent.

When the Red had stopped using his telekinetic powers, he had dropped Bradley's Hammer, and the station commander was now in the process of picking it up. "The Hammer did return in wrath, but only to be wielded by the prisoner, not the interrogator," he muttered under his breath as he reached down and picked up the giant stick.

"What's that, bro?" Patton asked him.

"Oh, nothing."

Patton walked slowly over to Bradley. "Well, with the prisoner gone, so I doubt that there's anything more we need to do on this station." He pulled out Lucy and replaced the shells in her barrel that he'd fired during the incident with the Red. Then he finished: "We should probably head back to base. That bastard knows where it is now. We need to make sure he doesn't try and take it out."

Bradley straightened up and slung the Hammer over his back. "I agree. But, before you do, bro, there's something we need to talk about."

"Oh?"

"I was of course watching the interrogation, or what there was of it, through the wall mounted cameras. I noticed that just before the prisoner let loose with his ability, he mentioned something about the architect of the Red Army 'bestowing upon him those abilities'. Whoever this person is, they are clearly extremely dangerous. I don't want to think what kind of being could give a person telekinetic abilities. We need to discover who they are and take them out ASAP."

Patton nodded. "Yes, I was just thinking about that. Though, this does call into question: if the Red had these abilities all along, then why did it take him this long to use them? We had him in custody for more than 24 hours, and yet it was only now that he used his telekinesis? He could've broken free earlier. Why?"

Bradley crossed his arms in thought. "Well, he did mention that it took perfect concentration to use it. In the three hours he was on the station waiting to be interrogated, he must've taken the time to prepare himself to focus enough to use his powers. Those hours were probably the best time he had to do so, since I doubt that while he was still at your base you gave him much peace and quiet."

"Got that right!" Patton confirmed.

Bradley continued: "That, and he may have been biding his time. Possibly hoping to gain any intel on us. In any case, our current priorities need to be preparing for the Red Army attack, and to find the person responsible for creating it in the first place. Bro, seeing as your base is in the section of the Wilderness closest to where the Red's base is, you and your team will be responsible for defending it when the enemy forces attack. This effort will, of course, be aided by your old friends when they arrive."

Patton nodded proudly. "Looking forward to it. Those Red fuckers won't be able to get past my group _and_ Lemon Squadron."

"In the meantime, I'll be utilizing the expertise of every man on this station to seek and destroy this person the Red mentioned. The...Architect of the Red Army."

"The Architect," Patton mumbled, thinking the title over. "Sounds like a good enough thing to call this person till we know more."

"Agreed," Bradley responded. "Well, now we all have our objectives. Let's get to it."

"Nice to see you again, bro," Patton told Bradley as they arm-hugged again. Patton then turned to the rest of his team. "Well, you overheard the conversation. I want you packed up in five. Then, we head back to base and make plans for defense of the Halothrii Wilderness."

"I'll get Brian," Clair offered, then joined Amber and Ryan as they headed back to their quarters to pack up.


	9. THE PASSING OF KEVIN GUINNESS

Darkness had fallen in the canyon, the presence of night now full upon the land. Having just finished a rather long dinner, the Green Replacement Team prepared to assault the Yellow's base and recover the Red prisoner. Their formation was much the same as it had been during their arrival to the canyon: Roche, Rezah, and Mr. Boom were in the driver, passenger, and gunner's seat, respectively, of the team's Warthog, and Kevin ended up by himself on a Mongoose, a seating arrangement that suited him just fine.

Without warning, Rezah climbed out of the passenger seat on onto the hood of the Warthog. He pointed his assault rifle in the general direction of Yellow Base and shouted: "Charge!"

However, in the exact opposite of the action he had just shouted, the Warthog did not move.

Rocher glowered almost embarrassingly at Rezah. "I can't move the vehicle with you still on its hood. Get off!" He gestured emphatically to help get his point across.

A light bulb clicked in Rezah's brain. "Ah, right, of course!" He returned to the passenger seat.

With that, Rocher began to move the Warthog foreword. On cue, Kevin began driving began moving his vehicle as well. "When they return, the Yellows will never know what happened to their prisoner," Rocher mused, taking his hands off the steering wheel long enough to rub them together.

"I still think we should've gone a lot sooner than this," Kevin complained. "We used up valuable time just…eating. We didn't know when the Yellows might return, and with every moment we remained at base, we risked the loss of this opportunity. That, and the food wasn't even that good anyway. How long does it take someone to eat a hot dog?"

"May I remind you, private," Rocher countered, "That the role of a soldier is to follow the orders of his commanding officer, and not to think. If I say we eat, then we eat. If I say we attack, then we attack. Believe it or not, Mr. Guy-"

"Kevin Guinness!"Kevin corrected angrily.

"-I really do know what I'm doing. My fail-proof plan will gain us the prisoner before the Yellows even begin to think something is happening at their base." Rocher continued on as if Kevin hadn't said anything.

* * *

"I think something is happening back at our base," Patton told Clair as he joined her and the rest of his team at the teleporter leading back to the Halothrii Wilderness.

"Oh, what makes you think that?" she asked, a little surprised by her boss's sudden, random declaration.

"It's just this gut feeling," Patton responded. "The last time we were on this station, it ended with us heading back to our base believing that it was under attack because the mercenary we were interrogating was lying to us…convincingly. And now what we're about to leave again, I just can't help feeling that this time, because we're not expecting it, something really _is_ happening back at our base."

"Yeah, I'm feeling that too." Amber noted, shifting her grip on her sniper rifle. "I just hope we're both wrong.

"If you aren't, we'll deal with it soon enough," said Ryan. "I stocked up on as much ammo as I was allowed while I was here, and if someone is at our base, they'll regret it." He mounted his rocket launcher on his shoulder in some attempt to look cool as he finished the latter sentence, but only succeeded in almost falling over as the weight of the launcher unbalanced him. Clair quickly propped him back up to his feet.

Patton nodded in agreement with Ryan's conclusion. "You got that damn right. Now, let's move it. We're Oscar mike!"

Readying their gear, Yellow Team went through the teleporter single file, with Patton leading the way.

* * *

The Greens stopped their vehicles in front of the Yellow's base entrance structure. In the dark, the building took on a somewhat sinister appearance, the window on the lookout post on the roof taking on the form of a single, glaring eye.

Undeterred, Rocher got out of the Warthog, walked up to the door of the building, and knocked on it. A low, metallic _tonk_ echoed back. He tried the door control, but it didn't react. He tried to force the door open by grabbing its edge and pulling it open, but he couldn't get purchase on the lip.

"It appears to be locked," he reported.

"Well, that's not surprising," Kevin commented. "Let's just blow it up, or something."

"I have an idea!" Rocher announced, once again ignoring Kevin. He motioned to Mr. Boom, who aimed at the door. "Mr. Boom, fire your machine gun at the door to their base!"

Kevin would have slapped his face in frustration, but his helmet and visor prevented this. "That's not what I suggested! We need an _explosion_ that will force the door inwards. Bullets will just bounce off of it! And that's not a machine gun, it's a light anti-aircraft chain-gun!"

"Mr. Guy, what did I just tell you as we were driving here?" Rocher asked him.  
"I keep telling you, this won't work." Kevin insisted.

"I said that your job is to shut up and follow orders." He turned back to Mr. Boom. "Now then, fire!"

Mr. Boom fired at the door with the large chain-gun on the back of the Warthog. As Kevin had predicted, the bullets, despite being half an inch wide, just pinged off of the steel and fell onto the grass. As soon as Mr. Boom stopped, Rocher went back up to the door and tried it again. "Um, it's still locked." He thought a moment, and then announced: "I know what we need to do!"

"Fire a rocket into it?" Kevin suggested. "Blow it open with a shaped charge?"

"Mr. Boom, continue firing at the door with your machine gun. If we just keep it up long enough, it should give eventually."

Kevin wanted to scream with annoyance, but wisely chose not to. Instead, he put his head down on the Mongoose's handlebars and groaned.

* * *

The Yellows piled into the Falcon and took off into the air with haste. As he had promised just a minute ago, Ryan pulled out his rocket launcher and loaded a full magazine into it, for just in case someone was at the base when they arrived. From the Falcon, he would have a wonderful view of anything down there, and he would have an excellent shot.

As they approached, Patton realized that his gut had actually been right. There _was_ someone down there. He got closer and could see…the Green Replacement Team, mounted on a Warthog and a Mongoose. They appeared to be stuck outside the door, which came as no surprise to Patton as they were trying to cut through the door with the Warthog's turret and that the alloy of the door, made to look deceptively like steel, was actually specialized to be several times harder and reinforced against just this sort of attempt to breach it, as well as more intense ones, such as demolition charges. Though _that_ possibility seemed unlikely in this case, seeing as the Greens were firing at it with a chain-gun, despite the obvious fact that it wasn't doing anything.

Patton found himself wondering if these new Greens would have been able to get into the base if the door _was_ just steel.

 _I do miss the original Greens,_ he thought to himself before ordering Ryan: "Hobar, it looks like we do have company after all. Fire at will. Oh, and try to have fun while you're at it."

Ryan nodded and hefted his rocket launcher onto his shoulder. "You got it, boss!"

* * *

A carpet of bullet casings littered the ground surrounding the door as Mr. Boom fired nonstop at it. At this point, Rocher was beginning to wonder if the door really was made of steel, because it was hardly even denting under the hail of rounds. He motioned for Mr. Boom to stop, and the heavy weapons specialist took his thumbs of the turret's triggers. "This may not actually be working," he postulated.

Kevin sarcastically shot back: "Now, how could you possibly have come to that conclusion-"

He was interrupted by an explosion which knocked both vehicles over, tossing all four Greens into the air. Everyone scrambled off of the ground frantically the moment they regained their senses.

"What the hell was that?" screamed Rezah, gripping his Assault Rifle one-handed and swinging it around in search of a target.

Moments later, they heard an engine from up above them. They looked to the sky, and to their surprise found the Yellows staring back at them from their Falcon. A soldier was pointing a rocket at them from the passenger compartment, and arranged at his side were a mass of reload containers.

Patton, in the pilot's seat, was also eying the Greens. "Well, well, lookie what we have here," he called down to them through the Falcon's speaker system. "Four Greens where they don't belong."

"They're back!" Kevin screamed at Rocher, pointing unnecessarily. "You see, I told you we should've left to do this earlier!"

Any further attempt at conversation was interrupted by the impact of a second rocket, which sent Kevin soaring through the air. He landed seconds later, face down on the ground next to Mr. Boom. He didn't move.

"We need to get out of here now!" Rocher screamed. He motioned to Rezah and Boom, and together the three of them overturned the Warthog back to its upright side. Mr. Boom looked down at Kevin, who had still not moved, picked him up, and slung him over his shoulder like he was a sack of flour.

"Wow, you've been doing a lot of push-ups lately, haven't you?" Razah commented to Boom as the buff weapons specialist climbed into the passenger seat, Kevin still lying over his shoulder. With Rezah in the driver's seat, that left Rocher to take the gunner's seat. He almost always wanted to drive, but seeing as the Yellows were after them with rockets, there really wasn't a whole lot of time to argue. Rezah hit the accelerator, and the Warthog shot like a bullet back towards the Green's base entrance structure, barely outrunning another rocket fired from the Falcon and a long stream of insults and curses from the Yellow with the launcher.

"It doesn't look like they're following us," Rocher informed while looking back in the Yellow's direction from the gunner's seat. A second later he turned back to face his team. "Boom, how is Mr. Guy doing?"

Boom looked over at Kevin, who was still unconscious, then looked back at Rocher and shook his head.

Rocher sighed. "He looks pretty bad. We need to get him treatment the instant we get back to base."

Almost on cue, they arrived at their base entrance structure. The team hopped out and made a beeline for the elevator. Once they were in and beginning their descent, they finally began to relax.

A nice tune began playing from the speakers. "Ah, you put in elevator music, I see," Rocher noted.

"Yes, I did," Rezah confirmed. "It makes things…roomy."

Rocher nodded. "So it does."

The elevator doors opened. Mr. Boom quickly made his way to the storage room, which the former Greens seemed to have been using as an infirmary, and set Kevin down on a set of supply crates that made up a functional enough table. Rocher and Rezah entered the room, and Boom nodded at Rezah, as he was the only member of the team who had any kind of medical training. Rezah approached Kevin and gave him a thorough look over. Rezah pulled off the soldier's helmet, exposing a face heavy with bruising.

"How does he look, Sergeant?" Rocher asked after a moment.

"Well, he's still in one piece, but badly wounded. From his fall, he must've suffered some heavy concussions, possibly a couple broken bones. I doesn't look good, I'm afraid."

"Ah, yes, so tragic," Rocher responded. "Wait, he _is_ going to die, right?"

"Um, I'm pretty sure, yes. Well...no, yes. I'm just about sure."

Rocher nodded. "Good, good. I mean, good that I heard you correctly. Bad that he's dying, of course." Kevin began to stir. Groggily, he groaned. Rocher approached him. "Kevin, how are you feeling?"

"You called me…Kevin…"

"Oh, my mistake. I meant Mr. Guy." He paused, thinking over his previous sentence. "Wow, that was weird. I actually thought your name was Kevin there for a second. No idea what came over me." He shrugged.

Again, Kevin attempted to speak, forcing a surprising amount of anger into his voice: "My name _is-_ "

"Now then, moving on," Rocher interrupted. "You are dying, is that correct?"

Kevin stared up at Rocher's visor in confusion. " _Am_ I? I mean, I have one hell of headache, and I'm sore in places I didn't know I had, but-"

"I'll take that as a yes. Follow up question: Can I have your assault rifle?"

"What? What kind of sick jerk are you? Don't you already have one?"

"Is that a yes?"

"Commander," Rezah interjected. "Perhaps we should be taking this moment to say goodbyes and things, instead of talking about his possessions. This is a time of sadness, the end of someone's life."

"But I never really even knew him!" Rocher countered. "The only thing I can say I definitively know about this person is that their name is Mr. Guy. Oh, and he's the rookie of the team."

Kevin snorted in annoyance.

"But he's been with us the entire time we've been at this base!" Rezah reminded Rocher.

"Was he?" Rocher asked himself. "Oh, right, he was. I almost forgot." He turned back to Kevin. "Well, goodbye then. But before you pass on, how about that assault rifle…"

Kevin managed two final words: "Fuck…you…" With that, he passed out again.

Rocher looked at the still soldier, then turned back to Rezah. "So, you're sure he's dead then? I mean, it looks kind of like he's just sleeping really deeply."

Rezah scratched his helmet. "Well, I _think_ he's dead…"

Rocher stared up at the ceiling, pretending it was the sky. "Alas, poor Mr. Guy has passed on…oh, how we shall miss him!"

Mr. Boom stared at Rocher, shaking his head in a combination of disbelief and annoyance, then turned and made for the kitchen to eat something. The stupidity, as well as all this talking about death had made him suddenly crave more hot dogs.


	10. HOCKEY

As a single large party, the former Greens and the Clan of the Caged Watermelon was transferred to another of what French Panda called "Playlists." That was, sets of matchmaking that were for specialized types of games. This playlist seemed to feature funny, insane, stupid, chaotic, and awesome types of games, according to what the former Greens had been told by The Cake Is Truth. Things seemed to be going as expected until, all of a sudden, everyone from the Clan of the Caged Watermelon simply disappeared, and the former Greens were left on their own. The places on the screen that had been occupied the members of the Clan now said: "Searching for player."

"What the hell? What just happened?" Skope asked, staring at the blank spaces.

A voice responded to Skope's question: "Oh, the game split us up." The voice belonged to Exuberant Ned, speaking from the ether.

The Greens looked around cautiously. "You aren't next to us anymore. How can we hear you?" Jess asked confusedly.

"We're still in a party, so we can communicate even if we're playing different games. A very handy feature if something like this happens."

"Different games?" Nome muttered. "But are we not supposed to stick together?"

"There's a cap for the maximum number of players that can be on each team," French Panda explained. "So while we're in this playlist, we can talk to each other, but can't play alongside each other. Honestly, I'm surprised that the last game kept you with us. We already were at eight people, the cap for a custom game, and when you showed up it put us at twelve. But now I guess the game finally realized that twelve is too many. The cap for Action Sack is four, so you got split off."

"I see…" Nome said calmly.

On the screen, four "Player found" icons popped up in the place on the screen to take the place of the "Searching for player" icons.

"Well, I guess that means we found our match," Kenny commented. "Hay, 'match', 'matchmaking'. I get it now. It's called matchmaking because we have to make matches before we play!"

"Wow, you're a genius!" Angry Wet Sock said sarcastically. "Damn, you really are new to all this, aren't you?"

"Yes, as we have told you before," Nome responded. "Several times."

The screen changed to a list of maps and what appeared to be game types. Next to each of these sets was a hollow square. Skope walked up to it, and as he moved his hand close to each of the options it was highlighted with a light blue color. "I'm at a list of options for a game with a map," he informed Exuberant Ned. "What do I do?"

"Just pick one," Exuberant Ned responded. "The option with the most votes is the one that will be done."

The former Greens looked over the options quickly. A timer counted down from 10 seconds, and they guessed that once time ran out the game would pick the option with the most votes. "Well," Skope asked the rest of his team. "What do we want to do?"

"What the heck is Rocket Hog Race?" Kenny asked. "It sounds explosive. I want to do that one. Stuff blowing up is always good."

"I want to do Halo Ball," Jess said. "It sounds interesting somehow. The name's pretty funny too."

"I believe we should pick something that we are most familiar with," Nome lectured. "To pick something blindly, when our very lives may be at stake, would be an act of great foolishness."

The timer was on its last three seconds. "Hockey on Hockey Arena," Skope suggested. "We all know what hockey is. Hell, I played it back in high school. Let's do that."

"Indeed," said Nome.

Skope reached out and touched the icon "Hockey on Hockey Arena." The empty box next to it now showed the number 5, which Skope guessed must mean the total votes for it. The only other option with votes, "Halo Ball on Halo Ball Court", had 3 votes.

"Hey, we broke a tie," Kenny observed. "That was lucky."

The timer reached zero, and the option for Hockey rose to the top of the list. Another timer started, this one from 5 seconds. A message next to it said "Game starting in:"

"Well, here we go," Skope exclaimed. "Get ready!"

The former Greens were transported into a large room with two structures resembling field goals on either side. In the center of the room sat a ball, similar in shape to a golf ball. Everyone on the other team was running towards the ball. Skope looked to his hands to discover that he was holding what looked like a golf club, except it was massive, like the ball. Then he looked back at the ball. It was the largest ball he had ever seen. "What the hell? The ball is larger than I am!" Indeed, Skope estimated that the ball must be at least two meters in diameter.

Kenny had started running the instant the game began, and managed to beat the other team to the ball. He aimed with the golf club and whacked the ball in the direction of the other team's goal. The ball must have been extremely light, because the instant he touched the golf club onto it, it shot away from him with a frightening speed, knocking over a person on the other team in the process. The momentum of the ball killed the opposing player and sent his body skidding across the floor.

Looking over the situation, Nome realized that this could only be possible if additional force were applied to the ball from the golf clubs. This implied that the golf clubs were more then they appeared. With no one on the other team near enough to it to stop it, the ball rolled into the enemy's goal. The instant it did so, both sides of the goal shot out confetti and human skulls. The former Greens stopped in their tracks as they saw this.

"Damn! That was cool!" Kenny shouted.

"Um, French Panda?" Skope asked. "Why did the goal erupt with human skulls when we hit the ball into it?"

"You must be doing hockey, correct?" French Panda replied.

"Yeah, that's it," said Skope. "Though I don't think it's really that, cause we're using a _ball_ instead of a puck…"

"Yeah, whenever you score, the goals will do that. It's what happens to anyone who loses. Their heads are cut off and put inside special storage units in the goals, to remind players what will happen if they fail to win the game."

"I knew our lives were in danger!" Nome exclaimed in horror. "This universe is indeed barbaric!"

"Even if we win, we'll still be killing those other people!" Jess said. "What do we do?"

"Whoa, whoa, I was just joking around!" French Panda interrupted. "It's just a cool effect the game programmers put in. Geez, I had no idea you guys would take it so seriously."

"Don't ever do that do us again," Kenny ordered French Panda. "Seriously."

"Okay, fine!" French Panda said. "I won't."

"Still, it was worth hearing their reactions," Angry Wet Sock put in, chuckling. "You guys are absolutely hilarious."

"Let's just win this game and be done with it," Skope said through a sigh.

Since the former Greens had scored once, another ball had appeared in the middle of the arena, and as expected everyone on the other team was running for it. Kenny began running again, but this time the other team beat him to it. One of them brought down their golf club, and the ball unexpectedly shot straight up into the air. It landed near one of the side walls, and everyone hastily followed it. Golf clubs slashed at the ball again, sending it off on random trajectories, and this time it landed behind the enemy's goal.

"This may not be deadly, but this is still the absolute stupidest game of hockey I've ever seen, let alone played in," Jess commented, swinging her club at an enemy player that came to close. He went flying backwards into a wall, allowing Jess to make it past him.

"I believe this to be the stupidest game of hockey anyone has ever played in," Nome put in.

"That's what I just said!" Jess shouted.

Fighting behind the goal against the other team, Kenny finally managed to get the ball away from the enemy and hit it over the goal, to land in front of Jess. Without hesitation, she hit the ball into the enemy's goal. Again, confetti and fake skulls rained gleefully from the sides of the structure.

"Two down, three to go," Kenny shouted. "We can do this!"

That was when all light in the room blinked out. The former Greens looked around in confusion.

"Now what the hell is going on?" Skope asked. To the Clan of the Caged Watermelon, he asked: "Guys? Hello?"

A message appeared in his HUD telling him that all of them had left the party, and were no longer even in Xbox Live.

"I do not understand," Nome said nervously. "None of this should be happening. Something very wrong is happening."

He clenched his hands into fists, ready to fight. Against what, he didn't know.

Skope looked towards the other team, and watched as they all suddenly fell motionless to the ground. Another message on his HUD told him that all of them had quit the game. "They quit?" he asked. "But they weren't losing that badly!"

His eyes glued to the end of the room where the opposing team used to be, Nome exclaimed: "I do not believe they did so of their own free will. Another entity has forced them to leave."

Following his gaze, the other Greens looked to that end of the room. What they saw, Kenny would later mention "creeped him the hell out."

A giant, inky black mass occupied the part of the room where the opposing team used to be. At first it seemed to be just a large shadow, but then it began moving, and it became apparent that this…thing…was definitely corporeal. And moving with purpose.

Upon laying eyes on it, Jess let out a surprised yelp. "What the hell is _that_?" she screamed.

Everyone moved to the back end of the room as quickly as they could. The shadow steadily crept closer, until finally it was almost upon them. Then it did something even more frightening:

It spoke.

It didn't speak in any traditional sense. Rather, words appeared in the former Green's minds, as though the shadow were trying to insert such words into their subconscious.

 _You do not belong here,_ the cloud hissed. _You do not belong to this universe. But now, you belong to me._ _You are mine!_

The nature of the voice sent shivers down the spines of the former Greens. The psychic voice was cold and invasive, and did not hesitate to make clear that it wanted to harm them.

Before they had a chance to do anything, the shadow enveloped the former Greens. They felt the floor leave their feet. And then they were falling down a long shaft. After a couple of seconds of weightlessness, the former Greens crashed to the ground.

Skope looked up, straining painfully with the effort. He guessed he was bruised in at least five places, possibly more. But at least he was alive, a fact he could thank his armor for. He appeared to be in a small room with walls made of the same material as those in the hockey arena. The only door he could see was far above him, at least ten meters up from the floor. However, he could see no ladder or any other way of reaching it, and the walls looked mirror smooth. He was trapped.

The others were now getting up.

"Oh, what the hell happened?" Kenny groaned.

"I believe that the shadow, or whatever it really was, teleported us to this location somehow," Nome postulated. "It mentioned that we did not belong to this universe. I wonder how it became aware of this."

"Hey, guys? Our armor color has switched to green again," Jess realized out loud.

The other Greens looked at their armor. Sure enough, their armor was the standard-issue green color all Green Army soldiers were given.

"You're right!" Kenny exclaimed. "It must've happened when we got disconnected from the Clan of the Caged Watermelon."

"I hope they're alright," Skope said.

"I should hypothesize that they are," Nome answered. "The shadow entity made it quite clear that it was coming after us specifically."

Skope seemed to be comforted by that thought. "Yeah, that's true."

"I-is someone there?" a voice said groggily from one of the corners. The Greens looked to find a soldier in orange colored armor with a crimson secondary color was huddled as though he had been sleeping. Skope seemed to vaguely remember him from somewhere.

The soldier realized that, indeed, there were other people in the room, and sat up straight. "Oh, people! Thank goodness!"

"Do I know you from somewhere?" Skope asked him slowly, racking his mind as he did.

"Yeah, I think we all saw him somewhere before," Kenny said. "He defenantly looks familiar…"

Nome was the one who remembered first. "You came to us when we were confronting the Yellows, didn't you?" He asked the soldier. "That would have been almost exactly three days ago, I believe."

The soldier nodded. "Yes, that's right. I was saying hello to everything."

Jess cleared her throat. "But, um, you lit on fire then, didn't you?"

The soldier thought back. "Um, yeah, I might have. Definitely wouldn't be the first time." He laughed. "Strange, but whatever."

This reaction caught the Greens a little off guard. After an awkward moment, Nome continued the conversation by asked the soldier: "How did you end up here?"

Again, the soldier thought back. "Well, I was having a nice morning, and as usual I was saying hello to everything. The sun was out, the flowers were blooming, the grass was growing and everything was nice. Then all of a sudden, this giant black shadow thing came out and says, like, in my head, that I don't belong in this universe, and then BAM, I end up here."

"That's exactly what happened to us," Skope said. "Though I wonder exactly where 'here' is, and if or when we'll actually get out of here."

"So then, what's your name?" Jess asked the solder.

"Fred," the soldier responded. "Fred Oofig."

 _What kind of a last name is Oofig?_ Kenny thought to himself. _Well, at least it's not as ridiculous as Nome's last name._

"Right then, Fred," Skope said quickly. "Do you have any idea how we get out of here?"

Fred shook his head. "Nope. I've been stuck here ever since I got here, and to be honest I've kind of lost track of time."

"Then it would seem that we are at the mercy of whomever or whatever it is who put us here," Nome sighed. "We must hope that somehow we will escape."

The Greens sat down on the next to Fred. Jess let out a breath. "Well, it's been a long day anyways. I think we should all get some sleep."

"Yeah, I'm definitely tired," Kenny concurred.

"I concur," Nome joined in. "We must be well rested if we are to escape from…wherever we are."

And so, the Greens slowly drifted off to sleep, snug in the vain hope that their fates might somehow not end in this prison.


	11. BOOGYCOIL

From the pilot's seat of the Falcon, Patton watched the Greens retreat back to their base. "Amateurs," he mumbled under his breath. He turned around so he could call back into the passenger compartment. "Hobar, you did enjoy yourself, I assume."

"As you ordered, Sir," Ryan replied while reloading the rocket launcher. "Though I probably would have done it anyway..."

"Good work, soldier," Patton replied. He then landed the Falcon outside the Yellow's base entrance structure. Normally, he would have taken the Falcon straight to the warehouse landing pad, but he decided to let everyone else off first this time so they could get inside and go to sleep as soon as possible. The other Yellows piled off, with Brain being the last one to leave. He was staring at the last of the sunset through the gap in the eastern canyon wall until Patton shouted "Attention Private!" at the top of his lungs, which made the new Yellow seem to jump out of his armor and practically fall out of the Falcon. As soon as the former Blue had gotten off, Patton lifted off with the Falcon to take it to the landing pad with a call of "Don't wait for me!"

Flying above the top of the eastern canyon wall, Patton got a brilliant view of the Wilderness in twilight, though the very thought of the word soured the experience some.

It looked so different to him at this time of day. Everything seemed caught in a shade of purple, as if a violet veil had descended upon all of existence. He slowly entered the Warehouse with the Falcon, partly so he could spend as much time as possible staring at the beautiful view and also because it was getting dark, and set it down gently on the landing pad. He realized he must be getting better at compensating for the crafts random quirks, because it hardly made any THUNK when it hit the ground. He got out as the rotors slowly died. Behind him, the Warehouse door slowly ground shut and sealed with a dull _boom_.

He walked to his quarters, thinking over the events of the day. As he passed by Stone's Quarters (as proclaimed by the small hand-made sign attached to the door), he heard Amber whispering to someone.

 _Who could she possibly be whispering to,_ he wondered. Her door was slightly open, and out of curiosity and (so he told himself) the interest of base security, he peeked into her room. Still in her armor, but minus her helmet, Amber sat at one end of her bed, legs cross. At the other sat a fusion coil.

_Is that the fusion coil she "introduced" us to back at Red Base?_

Patton glanced in closer. He wasn't one hundred percent sure, but it certainly seemed to be the same coil.

Currently, Amber was talking quietly to it.

"I still can't believe the prisoner was telekinetic," she said to it, gesturing absentmindedly with her right hand. "I mean, it was just such a surprise. I've never even heard of that kind of thing happening until now, outside of Ryan's Star Wars rants. And considering that an army of Reds may be coming, it really does kind of scare me. If one Red was all it took to wreck that much havoc at Command, then just imagine what a hundred might do! Maybe even more!" She paused, seeming to have finished her thought. "So then, how'd you end up at Red Base?" she asked after a moment. "I thought you said your pile was sniped in the middle of the canyon. So how'd you end up so far away from it?" She waited for a few seconds. "You haven't said anything in a couple minutes. Are you all right?" Then she seemed to follow the fusion coil's gaze, and saw Patton in the doorway. Surprise filled her brown eyes.

"Boss. Um, hi."

"Private," he responded calmly, as if he hadn't just seen her talking to an apparently inanimate fusion coil. "Yes, I was just checking in, standard rounds and all. I noticed that you seem to be, um, talking to a fusion coil. Care to explain?"

She motioned to the fusion coil. "This is Vincent. I introduced him to you at Red Base. He's been living in my quarters ever since. And before you ask, he really does talk. He's just shy around other people." She nudged the fusion coil lightly with her arm. It rattled on the floor, then came to a stop. "C'mon, don't be shy. Say hi to Patton."

 _This is a joke,_ Patton decided. _She must be trying to see how far I'll go. Yes, that must be it. Because otherwise…_ He shrugged off the thought. _No, she's not nuts. She's one of the most mentally stable people I've ever known. Hell, Clair double green lighted her. This_ has _to be a joke._ He realized that he had been gripping the doorframe while watching Amber, and straightened up.

"Well, I'll just leave the two of you to have your conversation then. I've got a lot of base to cover and little time to cover it in." He turned to leave.

_Just play along with it for now. She can't keep up the joke for that long._

"Good night, boss. Have fun on your rounds." Amber called after him. And then: "Vincent, you're at least going to say good night to him, aren't you. Oh, you're so shy!"

Patton took in a deep breath. _She's really trying to put this over on me. I'll put up with it until the end of tomorrow. After that, I'm cracking down on the joke and using that fusion coil for target practice._ But another thought still nagged at him, making him worry slightly. _Jokes like these really aren't like her, though._ _Not at all. I don't like this one bit._ _What if it isn't a joke, and she's not going crazy? Could it be-_

Patton's thoughts were interrupted by the sudden sight of Brain stumbling, apparently blind, through the hallway. It wasn't difficult to see why; he had spray painted his armor yellow, and done a pretty good job of it. Every square centimeter of his armor was colored standard-issue yellow…including his visor. He even still had the spray can in his right hand.

"I can't see! Someone help me!" he cried out, before violently slamming into a section of the wall that jutted out further from the rest of it.

Patton just barely stopped himself from bursting out laughing, then reached out to steady the distressed Private with a firm hand. Clair, whose quarters were just around the corner, must have heard the commotion, because she came out of her room to see what was going on. She, too, had taken her helmet off.

"Brian, what have you done?" she asked with a tone of amusement, crossing her arms and shaking her head. She took out a cloth from a pouch on her belt and used it to wipe away most of the spray paint from Brian's visor, which thankfully hadn't dried on yet.

Brain gleefully exclaimed: "I can see!" He clapped his hands in glee and spun around.

"I want some kind of explanation," Patton ordered.

"Well…" started Brian. "Since I'm officially a Yellow now, I decided that I should look like a Yellow as well. I mean, it would be kinda dumb for a Yellow to have blue armor, right? So, I found the spray paint in the storage room–all by myself-and used it to color myself yellow. But I didn't know you can't see through spray paint, so when I put it on my visor…yeah. That's what happened." He shrugged.

Patton put his hand of Brian's shoulder. "In some ways, you're still a Blue. Don't forget that." Then he turned and continued the journey to his quarters. Before he turned the corner, he paused and called back; "Don't worry too much about the armor. Command's going to send you a whole new suit in a couple days."

With that, he turned around the corner and was out of sight.

Now that he could see, Brian was able to find his quarters as well. He thanked Clair for wiping off his visor, and then bid her good night before readying himself for bed. Minutes after he unsealed himself from his armor and adjusted the bed more to his liking, he was fast asleep.

He was woken up some hours later, but he didn't know by what. He simply jerked awake with no warning.

Confused, he looked around his room, until he saw something that made the hairs on the back of his neck stand on end. A fusion coil sat in front of the door to his quarters. This would have been fine with him (though the door seemed like kind of a stupid place to put a fusion coil), but Brian distinctly remembered that he didn't own a fusion coil. He didn't own much now that he was a Yellow. He'd left what little he used to have at his original base.

But then, he obviously did own a fusion coil, because one was clearly sitting in his room right now. With a shrug and a mental note to thank whoever was nice enough to give the coil to him the next day, Brian lay back down and tried to go to sleep.

Then he opened his eyes again.

The fusion coil was at the end of his bed.

Brain closed his eyes again and rubbed them with his fists. _It's just a trick of the light. I'm seeing things._

He opened his eyes again.

The fusion coil was _on_ his bed now.

He could feel the fusion coil watching him, just as he could feel its weight pressing down on his legs.

And then it, amazingly, spoke:

"You are Brian."

Brian shot up and moved as far to his side of the bed as he could, drawing the covers with him.

_The fusion coil…it's talking to me!_

The fusion coil spoke again: "So then, you're the 'failsafe' he was talking about."

Brian continued to stare at the fusion coil, paralyzed with fear and confusion.

The fusion coil continued: "If a former Blue is all you really are, then I can hardly understand why he thinks you're of such importance." The coil then shifted slightly, seeming to regard Brian with some kind of look. "I'll be watching you, Brian the Blue. I'll be watching you."

Brian blinked, and then the coil was gone. He looked around. The coil was nowhere to be found. He actually went so far as to get up out of bed and look around his room. Nothing.

Brian let out a sigh. _It must've been a really weird dream. I felt awfully awake during it, though. That's the last time I eat nachos before going to bed._

After one final glance around the room, he put his head back onto his pillow and let sleep overtake him once more.

* * *

Brian's standard issue alarm clock woke him up at precisely 0700 hours, as Patton had ordered him to set it to. With a yawn, he rose, quickly put on his armor and went downstairs for breakfast. The four other members of his team greeted him with variations of "Good morning," as well as a grunt of "Hello, Private," from Patton. Brain sat down and prepared to serve himself some food when he saw something that made him stop.

Sitting on the floor next to Amber was the fusion coil. And it was staring at him; he could feel it. He remembered the words the coil had spoken to him in the middle of the night: _I'll be watching you, Brian the Blue. I'll be watching you._

* * *

Kevin's head felt like it had been run over by a Scorpion Tank. He groaned in pain and managed to sit up. He discovered that he had somehow ended up in the storage room and was on a pile of supply crates that looked formed into some makeshift table.

_What the hell happened while I was out?_

He got down off of the crates and shakily went through the door to the hallway, checking the time in his HUD as he did so.

0712.

_I've been out for nearly ten hours. Great. Just great…_

He reached the kitchen, and saw that the rest of his team was gathered around the table eating calmly.

Rocher took one look at Kevin and then shot up out of his seat, sending his bowl of mac and cheese skittering across the floor.

"It's moving!" he screamed, pointing in horror.

Rezah followed Rocher's gaze and finger, then murmured: "Oh my god it's a zombie!"

He pulled out his assault rifle and pointed it at Kevin. "Don't come any closer! Whatever weird reanimation virus you've got, I don't want it!"

Between them, Mr. Boom looked back and forth with a demeanor of surprise, then shrugged and went back to eating his pancakes.

Kevin put his hands up, then said angrily: "Okay, what the hell is going on? The last thing I remember is getting thrown through the air by rocket explosions, and then I wake up in the supply room on top of some crates. Stop playing games and tell me what's happened while I was out. Now!"

"It speaks," Rocher observed aloud. Then he turned to Rezah. "Do zombies speak?"

Rezah thought for a moment before replying: "I don't think so. Well, I mean they say "brains", but other than that no." He paused, then added: "I think he might not be a zombie after all."

"You think?" Kevin shot back from his side of the room. "I'm not a freaking zombie!"

Rocher and Rezah kept their weapons raised. "Well then, what the hell are you?"

"What am I? What the hell is that supposed to mean?"

"We know you died," Rocher explained. "And since you obviously came back from the dead just now, that means you can't be human."

"The hell?" Kevin exclaimed. "I never died! I was just out cold for a couple hours!"

"You did!" Rocher said sternly. He then turned to Rezah. "He did die, didn't he?"

Rezah nodded. "Yup. We were both there."

Rocher turned back to face Kevin. "You see? You did die."

Mr. Boom continued eating his pancakes, clearly not interested at all in the current conversation. Instead, he turned his attention to the jar of maple syrup that sat next to his plate.

"He might be a ghost," Rezah suggested.

"Yeah, that's true," Rocher elaborated. "Since he's not a zombie, he must be a ghost! It makes perfect sense."

"The Ghost of Mr. Guy," Rezah said in awe.

"For the last time, my name is Kevin Guinness!" Kevin exclaimed angrily.

"No, your name is Mr. Guy," Rocher insisted. Then he put his hand to the chin of his helmet in thought, lowering his weapon as he did. "Unless, it _isn't_ Mr. Guy."

Rezah stared at Rocher in startled confusion. "But, we've been calling him Mr. Guy this whole time!"

"Which can only mean that he is the ghost of someone not named Mr. Guy and not named Kevin Guinness."

"What the hell are you on?" Kevin asked them. He could scarcely believe this conversation was even happening. He'd seen stupidity in superior officers before, but never to this level...

Rocher finally reached a conclusion. "I know who and what this is," he said while pointing at Kevin. "He is, and can only be, The Ghost of Not Kevin."

Kevin stared dumbfounded at the two of them. He wondered if it would do any good at this point to shout his real name at them for the hundredth time, but he decided probably not.

"So, the Ghost of Not Kevin is now on our team," Rezah thought out loud. "What now?"

Rocher was apparently also thinking, but deeply. He was massaging the chin of his helmet quite vigorously now, enough to cause the energy shields to spark on for a moment. "We still need to get the Red prisoner back from the Yellows. And since we have a ghost working for us, I think I have just the way to do it." He began telling his plan to the rest of his team, and as soon as breakfast was done they began preparations to carry their commander's orders out.


	12. THE WRATH OF THE GHOST OF NOT KEVIN

Patton stood outside the Yellow's base entrance structure in the canyon as warm morning sun washed upon his armor, shotgun cleaned meticulously, out, and at the ready. Ryan stood behind him with his rocket launcher perched on his shoulder, the strap of a grenade launcher slung across his other. They were awaiting the arrival of Lemon Squadron, and Patton had ordered Ryan to look as badass as possible for the occasion, hence the poses and heavy weaponry.

"Any idea when they're going to arrive, boss?" Ryan asked.

Patton shook his head. "Within the next hour, I believe. Lemon isn't known for being supremely punctual; being unpredictable keeps you alive."

"And we have to stay here the whole time?"

"Hobar, do you remember that Blue Hunter holosim I showed you when you first got posted to this base?"

Ryan thought back. "Is that the simulation where you go around killing unsuspecting Blues with a shotgun, and the goal is to kill all of them without anyone noticing you?"

Patton nodded. "Yup, that's the one. My favorite."

"And how does that have anything to do with right now?"

"It teaches you how to be patient. In other words, shut up and don't talk."

"Yessir," Ryan grunted, shifting the rocket launchers center of gravity.

The two of them continued standing there for some more minutes. That was when Patton noticed something moving towards them from the other end of the canyon. No, two somethings: upon closer inspection via his helmet's magnifier, it turned out to be a Warthog and a Mongoose.

For a moment, he thought it might be Lemon, arriving in an unexpected way, which was to be expected of them. But the vehicles were coming from the direction of Green Base.

"It's the Green replacement team, FART, or whatever they call themselves," Patton realized aloud. "They're actually giving it another go. How stupid _are_ these people?"

"Bordering on non-sentient, I'd guess." Ryan added. Patton grunted in agreement.

The Yellows continued watching the Green's Warthog as it neared them. The Mongoose followed behind, which was being driven by the Green Ryan had blown into the air with his rocket launcher on their last encounter. After some moments, the two vehicles finally reached their base. The Greens hopped out and walked up to Patton and Ryan. Ryan readied his grenade launcher, but Patton motioned for him to stand down.

"So then, what the hell are you people doing here again?" Patton asked their leader, who was named Roche or something if he remembered correctly. _Chocolates…yes, that's his name. Ferrero Rocher._

After a moment, he thought _now I want chocolate. Great._

"You are going to surrender the prisoner to us," Rocher ordered Patton, breaking the Yellow commander from his thoughts of sugary treats.

Ryan interrupted: "We don't have-"

Patton made a slashing motion with his hand, silencing him before he could complete his sentence.

"Let's not tell them that just yet," he whispered over his TEAMCOM. "I want to see exactly what they try on us."

Ryan nodded. "Fair enough." He stepped back slightly, but raised his grenade launcher as he did; the perfect stance to arc a 40mm grenade around Patton and into the Greens.

Patton turned back to face Rocher. "So then, what's to stop us from just killing all of you the instant you try to get past us?"

Rocher crossed his arms. "Ah, but can you kill someone who is already dead?"

Patton snickered. "What the hell are you talking about?"

Rocher pointed at the driver of the Mongoose and laughed: "Behold the spirit of the soldier you killed on our last encounter, bent upon revenge. The Ghost of Not Kevin will go through all of you and destroy your base with his ghost powers if you do not surrender!"

"I still can't believe we're actually going through with this," the soldier, Not Kevin apparently, groaned.

Rezah got on the hood of the Warthog (again, Patton noted) and shouted at the Yellows: "You are completely defenseless against the spirit of this guy. Victory is our guaranteed! It is pointless to resist!"

Patton was on the verge of busting out laughing. "Let me make this simple," he told the Greens. "We're not surrendering, so leave before we do to you what we did last time. Except this time you _won't_ be leaving."

Rocher turned to Not Kevin. "Not Kevin, it is time to show these fools that we cannot be defeated. Invade their base. Take the prisoner!"

"What?" Kevin responded. "How the hell am I supposed to do that?"

Rocher shrugged. "Um, just go through a wall or something. However you ghosts do things. I don't care. Just get in the base somehow!"

Confusedly, Not Kevin approached the door into the Yellow's base, which was closed like last time, Patton having sealed it with a press of his tacpad the instant he recognized his enemy approaching. He put his hands up and touched them to the door's surface and pushed. Then he pushed harder. He grunted with the effort. Finally, he told Rocher: "I don't know what you thought would happen, but this isn't working."

Rocher thought for a moment. "Ah, I see the problem," he finally realized. "His armor is holding him back. Not Kevin, remove your armor."

Kevin stood still for a moment, shocked, then crossed his arms and shook his head. "Okay, I am getting really fed up with this. Look, I am not a ghost, and I'm sure as hell not taking off my armor in front of Yellows!"

"It's an order, soldier," Rocher informed him, jabbing his finger at Kevin. "You may be dead and all, but you're still under my command, at least until you see the light or whatever. Just do as I say."

"An order," Rezah shouted at him. "Ooooooo!" He drew back with a gasp.

Kevin growled: "Fine, I'll take off my armor and then you'll see I'm not a ghost!"

And so, less than five meters from where Patton and Ryan stood, he began removing his armor. It was a very lengthy process that took (on average) about an hour, so the progress was slow.

Patton and Ryan watched in stunned disbelief as Kevin continued to slowly remove sections of his armor.

"These are Greens we're watching, right?" Ryan asked his boss. "Not Blues? Because these guys are on a level of fucking stupid that I don't think I've ever seen before. I mean, shit, those guys who clog the Internet with bad Star Wars fanfictions are probably smarter than these guys!"

"This is truly amazing," Patton agreed. He glanced up at the sky, then noted "I hope Lemon Squadron gets here soon. They _really_ shouldn't miss this."

"I'm getting popcorn," said Ryan. He went through the entrance door. As soon as it opened, the Greens perked up. But Ryan was quick, having been the youngest in a family of six, and he had done this plenty of times; the door closed again before the Greens had a chance to even begin running for it. Ryan came back out with a full batch of popcorn some moments later. Clair and Amber followed behind him, keeping a quick stride, as Ryan had advised them so that the door remained open for as short an instant as possible. Additionally, they hurried so that they could catch the strangeness that Ryan had reported was happening outside their base. By this time, Kevin was nearly done changing out of his armor, with only the waist and thigh plates still on, those being the hardest to remove.

"I'm glad we didn't tell them about the prisoner," Ryan remarked to Patton quietly. "If we had, we would never have gotten the chance to see this."

"Agreed. And no one better say anything about it now either." Patton sent the last comment over TEAMCOM so Amber and Clair could hear it.

"Wilco." Clair replied.

"No problems here," Amber agreed, chuckling. "No way in hell I'm going to mess this up."

"Please tell me you're recording this," Ryan muttered.

"Of course I am. Might as well get some use out of my helmet cam."

By this time, Kevin was completely out of his armor. He was average height, light skinned, with brown hair and eyes of a similar color. His apparel was just a white shirt and red undershorts: his pajamas. His choice of clothing wasn't surprising to any of the Yellows; as most soldiers in all armies spent almost all their time in their armor, no one saw what they were wearing. And, more often than not, the only reason they would remove it would be to sleep on leave. Wearing pajamas underneath meant the time used to change from normal clothing to sleepwear could now be used for more sleep, even if it was only a couple minutes at the most.

Fully unarmored, Kevin briskly strode to the door a second time. Again, he pushed against it, and again he was unable to get through it. He turned back to face the other Greens. "You see!" he shouted, throwing out his arms. "I am NOT a freaking ghost!"

"Your clothes are just holding you back," Rocher said after some more thought. "All outer layers must be removed from the body. Clothes included. That must be why it's still not working."

Clair giggled, Ryan began snickering, and Amber stared in shock and awe. Patton simply shifted his position and subtly wiped away a small smudge that had appeared on his shotgun's barrel.

"No," Kevin responded firmly. "No, I am _not_ getting naked in front of a bunch of Yellows, _especially_ when there's two girls up there! That's not happening."

"I order it!" Rocher shouted at him, putting surprising force behind it.

"You know what, fuck you!" Kevin shouted back, just as forceful. "I'm sick of this. You forget my name, make decisions that put us all in needless danger, fail to listen to common sense and simple facts and now…THIS! I've had enough. I'm not doing this anymore." He took a deep breath and then shouted: "FUCK YOU!" as loud as he could.

With that, he made for the Mongoose, taking the pieces of his of his armor with him.

"I _order_ you to get back there, take your clothes off, and infiltrate the base!" Rocher continued shouting after him.

Kevin got on the Mongoose, gunned the engine, and, flipping his CO the finger, vrommed off towards the shoreline, sending twin plumes of dust into the air. The other Greens stared after him, with Rocher still shouting.

"I think we should tell them now," Ryan suggested to Patton.

Patton nodded. "Yup, it's time for the punch line."

"Tell us what?" Rocher asked, Patton having spoke loud enough for him to hear.

"That we don't actually have the prisoner." The Yellow commander said calmly.

Rocher gave a nervous laugh. "That's…that's not actually very funny."

"No, we really don't," Ryan elaborated. "We transported him to a more secure location last evening. He's not here." He shrugged, shifting his rocket launcher to do so. "Sorry."

"Oh, and why should I believe you?" Rocher asked, voice taking on a desperate edge.

"Why would we lie about it?" Patton said back, still calm as ever. "You obviously don't have the means to get inside our base. If we still did have him, then what would be in it for us to tell you we don't?"

Rocher stood in place for a few seconds while he let the facts sink in. "Shhhhhit," he finally proclaimed, slamming his palm across his visor. "This whole thing was completely pointless, wasn't it?"

"Yup," said Ryan. "Well, for _you_ anyway."

"But worth watching, definitely," commented Clair.

"And posting on YellowTube," Amber noted, referencing the Yellow Army's open-source video posting site.

Rocher angrily growled: "Well, we can still infiltrate your base anyways! Open fire on the Yellows!"

Patton responded to Rocher's spontaneous act of desperation by walking up to the already embarrassed Commander, yanking the assault rifle from his hands, and kneeing him in the gut before he had a chance to retaliate. Patton then pointed Lucy's barrel at the Green's forehead as he attempted to suck air into his lungs.

"Now listen," he ordered Rocher. "Just because what happened this time was funny as hell, I'm going to let you live. But if you ever so much as think about attacking this base or any member of my team again, your brains _will_ be scattered across the backdrop of the canyon wall before you can blink. Is that clear?"

Reluctantly, Rocher nodded. "Yes."

"Yes, sir! Say it!"

"Yes…sir," Rocher growled, voice tainted with hate.

Patton gave him a brutal shove that sent him back a good two meters and removed Lucy's barrel from his forehead. "Now fuck off, before I change my mind."

Rocher made for the Warthog. "Retreat," he ordered Rezah and Mr. Boom. "Our mission has ended in vain." Rezah and Mr. Boom took their places in the vehicle, and the Greens drove off in defeat.

"You haven't seen the last of us!" Rezah howled, despite what Patton had just told his CO. Patton simply chuckled.

"Wow, you really told them, boss," Ryan commented.

"Prick had it coming." Patton said, shrugging. "It's kind of sad that Lemon Squadron missed this, though. Hester would have gotten a kick out of it."

"No worries. I got it." Amber noted, tapping the side of her helmet. "I'll upload it to YellowTube with the rest of this little scene. Featured video here I come!"

"Very good. He checked the time on his HUD. "Speaking of Lemon, they should be here any minute now."

"I think I'll go back inside," Clair said. "It looks like the show's over, and I've got stuff to do."

"Me too," said Amber. "I need to get this footage off my cam and onto the web before I forget. That, and take some time to take my mind off of what I just saw."

She shuddered, hard enough for her armor to clatter against itself.

"I think I'll stay, though," said Ryan. "I've always wanted to meet the legendary Lemon Squadron. By the way, do they autograph?"

"No," said Patton.

"Oh," Ryan muttered, disappointed. "Oh, well. Seeing them in person should be more then awesome enough."

"Don't forget, you're standing next to one already," Patton reminded him.

"Oh, that's right. I keep forgetting. You know, I still can't believe you didn't tell me you used to be a member until just yesterday."

"Well, you were on a need to know basis."

"True."

Patton continued: "If anyone can be relied upon to stop the Reds, it's them. I just hope to God or reality or whatever that they'll be enough…"

Patton paused, then tilted his head sideways, listening to something. After a moment, he looked straight up.

The rest of his team followed his example. Above them, burning brilliantly against the darkening sky, three sparks of light could be seen, growing bigger by the second.

"Stand too, soldiers." Patton barked. "Lemon's here!"


	13. THE PORTAL

If it had not been for the clock app on his HUD, Skope would have completely lost track of time. Currently, it read 8:37 in the morning. He, the rest of his team, and a character named Fred Oofig, were still trapped in the pit in which they had been inserted hours earlier. Skope realized that he must have fallen asleep, because he felt far better rested then he remembered, and he was lying completely on the floor.

"You're the last to wake up," Jess confirmed as soon as Skope began stirring.

"Was I really out all night?" Skope asked, raising himself onto his elbows.

Jess nodded. "Yup."

"I'm SO bored!" Kenny groaned from the darkness, apparently oblivious to the conversation.

As if to answer Kenny's exclamation, sounds could suddenly be heard from the door far above them, the same one they had been shoved through earlier. The Greens shot up. They heard a creaking sound, and then light flew into the room, causing the Greens to have to lower the tint on their visor displays so that their eyes could adjust. A voice called to them from above: "Here's something to eat, losers!"

Several objects fell from the door, and one of them landed on Skope's visor with a wet _splat_. Skope pulled it off and looked at it: a grilled cheese sandwich. As he stared at the sandwich in confusion, the door closed again, and near darkness returned.

"Thanks, asshole!" Kenny shouted back before mentioning more calmly: "Actually, I'm kinda hungry." He yanked his helmet off and downed the sandwich in about ten seconds, chewing noisily. Each taking a sandwich from the ground for themselves, the other Greens followed suit, though not nearly as ravenously as the weapons specialist had.

"We need to find some way of exiting this chamber," Nome stated after he had swallowed the last bites of his food.

"I don't see how we can get all the way up to the door, though," Jess said, mouth still full.

"What if we all get on each other's shoulders?" Fred suggested.

"Considering that the combined masses of the top four people would be in excess of three hundred kilograms, the weight could prove difficult to endure for the person on the bottom," Nome countered. "It would be a highly impractical solution, even with our armor supporting most of the weight."

"But what else can we do right now?" asked Kenny. "Just sit and wait?"

Nome hmmmmmmed for a moment before realizing: "Yes, perhaps this is the only option. And it is certainly worth a try. The benefits outweigh the risks almost exponentially."

"Yeah..." Skope agreed. "But who's going to be on the bottom?"

After a moment of consideration, Nome suggested using the sandwiches to decide, similar to drawing straws. The Greens promptly drew cheese slices from the remaining sandwiches to determine who would go on the top and bottom. Nome drew the longest piece of cheese, which meant he would go on top. Skope drew the shortest. And in the middle were Jess, Kenny, and Fred.

Skope sighed as he got onto position under the door. "I'm really starting to dislike these situations," he grumbled.

"You and me both," concurred Jess as she slowly climbed onto Skope's shoulders. After a short moment of teetering while Skope adjusted to the communications specialist's weight, they pressed themselves against the wall.

Jess was followed by Kenny, and Kenny by Fred. Finally it was Nome's turn. As the medic slowly ascended the ladder composed of his teammates, Skope and Jess grunted with the added weight. "Thank God for our armor," Skope commented. "Otherwise, I'm not sure I'd be able to do this."

"You and me both," Kenny complained as Nome's foot pressed against his visor.

Nome finally reached Fred's shoulders and looked around. Above him was a meter or two of open space. "I believe I can see a lever, or some similar contraption," he observed after a moments looking. On the left side of the metal door was a lever with a vertical slider. Nome reached over to it, an effort made difficult by his limited reach, and just barely managed to pull it down before being forced to move back or tip the whole human tower over. The instant he did so, the room began to shift.

At first Nome thought he was being lifted up by Fred, but when he looked down he realized that it was actually the floor of the pit that was moving upwards at a leisurely pace. Realizing what was happening, Nome quickly descended the human ladder and made it to the floor. "The lever is raising the ground to the door's level," he explained. "I believe that lever he ensured our escape."

The floor rose slowly, but after about a minute it finally reached the door. No longer needing to stay in the ladder formation, and in fact in danger of being smashed into the roof, the other Greens quickly dismounted and formed a group at the door.

"I think I can hear voices on the other side," Jess whispered. She pressed her head against the door and listened. Sure enough, from the other side came the low grumble of conversation. She stepped back and Skope, who was nearest the door, pushed his right arm up against it ever so slightly, hoping like hell that it wasn't locked and wouldn't squeak when he pushed it open. As the door moved on its vertical axis, the Greens could see a large table with several figures surrounding it. Figures in red armor. They were talking with each other and laughing.

"Do you think these guys are the actual 'Red Army' kind of Reds?" Kenny whispered.

"I believe so," Nome confirmed. "The reds we fought alongside in 'matchmaking' would never have allied themselves with the shadow we encountered in the hockey arena, or imprisoned us in that pit and left us alone. Had they been in league with it, it most likely would have communicated with them."

"That's a point," Kenny responded.

Skope did a quick headcount; eight Reds at the table. He hoped that there weren't even more Reds at other places in…whatever location this was. One of the Reds at the back, facing the door, suddenly looked up. The seven other Reds slowly followed his gaze to the door the Greens were peaking out of. In that moment, the shit hit the fan.

Beverage glasses were dropped to the table, spilling multi-colored liquids across it. Those who had their helmets off quickly pulled them back on. All of them got up and pulled out carbines, scaled-down versions of the standard assault rifles used mainly by special forces, from under their chairs and for their resting places leaning up against the table.

"Houston, we have a problem," Fred observed in rising panic.

The Reds opened fire.

As gunfire erupted, the Greens shot out of the door and tried to find cover in the room the Reds were in, to remove the risk of being thrown back into the pit had they stayed near the door and the less likely chance of getting injured, thanks to their armor's shields. Skope and Nome found cover behind the poker table, tipping it up to provide more protection.

"We need weapons!" Skope shouted.

"I have an idea," stated Nome calmly, apparently oblivious to the bullets whizzing by his head. He poked his head up over the brink of the table, eyed one of the shattered glasses sitting there, and flicked it with his left glove at one of the Reds. The piece of glass hit his helmet with enough force to trigger his shields. In confusion, the Red stumbled, tripping over a fallen chair, and crashed loudly to the floor. Nome took the opportunity to lunge and grab his carbine. The Red tried to stop him, but Nome applied his hand to the Red's neck, and an instant later he was unconscious. Nome turned and threw the rifle to Skope. "Here is your weapon, my comrade."

Skope grabbed the rifle out of the air easily. "Thanks, Nome."

Meanwhile, Jess, Kenny, and Fred had found cover behind a desk on the opposite wall of the room. "We have to get out of here!" Kenny screamed, covering his head to make himself a smaller target. "We're stuck in this room with a bunch of Reds and no room to maneuver, let alone any weapons."

Fred looked to the door nearest them. "That Skope guy seems to be keeping them pretty distracted with the gun he got. I think we can make it to that door if we all run at the same time, and take them by surprise."

Jess nodded. "Yeah, I think it's worth a shot. Safety in numbers."

"I'm game," Kenny agreed."

Fred counted down: "One…two…three!"

The three of them lunged for the door and managed to make it through before the Reds had a chance to react.

To their surprise, sunlight greeted their visors. They stood in what looked to be the ruins of a city. Broken buildings littered a wide street, which itself was buried under several centimeters of random rubble and debris. At the street's end sat a large tower, which was completely intact and looked to have been constructed after whatever catastrophe happened to the city.

"I think we should head for that tall building over there," recommended Jess, motioning to the tower. "That's probably our best bet for cover. Everything else around here looks busted.

Kenny nodded. "Yeah, but what about Skope and Nome? We can't just leave them to face the Reds by themselves!" They looked back. Skope and Nome seemed to be doing an okay job of holding their own. Nome had managed to get a carbine for himself, and with Skope's help they were keeping the Reds in cover on the other side of the table. Fred spotted a tall desk sitting on one side of the door. Realizing what to do, he did a rather impressive roll to get over to it and then shoved it over. The desk gave Nome and Skope the cover they needed to make it to the door.

Once Nome and Skope had joined Jess, Kenny, and Fred, the five of them turned to face the street. "The Reds will pursue us," said Nome, taking the time to slide a new magazine into his captured carbine. "We must hurry."

"The tower," Jess stated. "That's where we need to go."

"It's a good a place as any," agreed Skope. "But I _really_ wish I had my sniper rifle right now."

Without further hesitation, the Greens began running to the tower in the distance, kicking up clouds of pulverized building dust in their wakes. Skope could hear footsteps behind him, and when he looked back over his shoulder he saw that the Reds, all eight of them, even the one Nome had apparently put down, were following them. The Greens panted heavily as they gave it their all to outrun their pursuers. It was enough; they managed to reach the tower well before the Reds and hurried through the door. Nome found a button on the side of the door, which closed and locked it from their side, though not as securely as he would have liked. Looking upon their new surroundings, the Greens found themselves at the bottom of a long shaft with layers of glowing see-through orange panels going across it.

"What now?" Kenny asked, voice echoing off the empty space of the tower.

"This is a dead end," Skope exclaimed. "These panels are blocking our way!"

Gingerly, he reached out to the lowest panel with his carbine, and unexpectedly he was lifted off of the ground though the panel and into the one above. He cried out in surprise. It seemed as though it was the panels that were moving him, each one accelerating him up to the next, which repeated the process, like some strange kind of elevator. He moved up the shaft until he finally reached the top, where he was deposited in the room atop the tower. He looked around a moment. A console sat next to a wide window. From up here, he could see the lines of streets that went through the entire area. He went back to the shaft and called down: "Guys, I think there's some kind of control room up here."

Nome went into the "lift" next. As soon as he joined Skope in the tower's control room, he remarked: "What a magnificent contraption. It would appear that the designers of this structure have placed levels of one way energy shield panels parallel to each other in such a way that it provides constant upwards acceleration. Efficient _and_ enjoyable. That is a hard thing to pull off in architecture."

After he was done admiring the room, Nome called down to the others that it was safe, and soon all five of them were at the top of the tower.

"Nice view, but now what?" Kenny asked, glancing out the window.

"Surely there's some control up here that can help us," Jess suggested. She began looking over the many buttons on the consoles. "A way to radio for help, maybe? Or _something_ to signal with."

All of a sudden, a giant _boom_ , followed by a loud _crash_ sounded from the bottom of the shaft.

"They must've just blown down the door!" Skope exclaimed. "Jess, do something now!"

"I'm still looking things over," she said quickly. "But I'll try and hurry up."

Nome walked over to the shaft door and hit a switch near it, which sealed a large camera-shutter like door over the entrance for the time being. "That will buy us some time," he said. "But I do not know exactly how much."

On one of the consoles, Jess spotted a large red button. "I wonder what this does," she wondered out loud.

"Avalanche Base had a similar button in their facility," Nome mentioned after he glanced over the button. "It was used to scientifically test who would push it and who would not, though the button itself did not actually do anything."

"If we don't get out of here soon, we're screwed anyways," Kenny said. "I think you should press it and see what happens."

Jess hovered her hand above the button. "Here goes nothing!" She cried.

With much aplomb, she pressed it.

An automated voice said through the speaker system: "Portal activated. No coordinates detected. Please wait while it is configured to preset destination." An inactive teleporter in the back of the room burst to life, a green light opening up between its top and bottom ends.

"Great, we have a way out of here!" Kenny exclaimed.

While the rest of them were at the console, Fred had been investigating the rest of the control room in an attempt to be helpful. He had spotted a pad on one of the walls, and when he activated it a hidden door slid open with a soft _hiss_.

"Hey, guys!" he called over. "I think I found something!"

The five of them entered the room and discovered that it was packed with fusion coils. Thousands of them in ordered stacks. The air in the room was filled with a low, almost subsonic _humm_ , the noise that most people associated with fusion coils, except on a much larger level.

"Oh my God that's a lot of fusion coils," Kenny commented loudly.

A speaker sat on an ornate pedestal in the very center of the room. Skope walked over to it. "Why is there a speaker in here?" he asked. "It's almost as though this room was set up so that people could talk to the fusion coils." He laughed, extremely amused by the thought. "Talking to fusion coils. How strange."

Without warning, a crash sounded from the shaft, and the floor the Greens were standing on began tilting in the direction of the shaft. Apparently, the Reds below _really_ wanted in.

The Greens hurried back into the control room to find that the door to the shaft had been blown clean open, the metal it was made of actually glowing from the heat. To make matters worse, two Reds were standing in the room, and from the sound of the shaft the other six were on their way up via the lift platforms. This left only one option, which was hastily voiced aloud by Nome:

"To the teleporter. Now!"

The Greens raced to the teleporter, but one of the Reds hit something on his tacpad, and a shield wall powered up to block the Green's path, fast enough that Kenny ran straight into it with a loud electric sizzle. With nowhere else to turn, the Greens retreated to the fusion coil room. "This sucks!" commented Fred, forcing himself against the wall in an attempt to get some cover. "They've caught us." He crossed his arms angrily and then continued: "You know, I'm starting to get real sick of these guys. All I've ever wanted to do is say hi to nature, but then these guys come along, capture me, and then chase me. I'm so angry-"

All of a sudden, with a loud _whump_ , his armor caught fire.

"Oh my God I'M ON FIRE! WAAAAA!" Fred howled, swatting at the flames that engulfed him. He began running around the room with a long trail of flame following him.

The Reds had managed to enter the room by this point, but when they saw a flaming person running so close to the fusion coils they stopped.

"He could destroy the Council!" one of the Reds shouted, pointing a finger at the flaming soldier. "Stop him!" With that, all of the Reds turned their attention to Fred.

Realizing that this was their chance, but feeling slightly guilty, the Greens made a mad dash for the teleporter. The shield wall was still blocking the way, but after Jess hurriedly mashed a few buttons on one of the consoles it slid down.

"I think I finally figured out how their system works!" she remarked proudly.

"Run now, talk later!" Skope shouted at her while motioning to the teleporter. Nome and Kenny went through, and Skope followed closely behind.

Before heading through herself, Jess took one final look at the fusion coil room. The Reds were still after Fred, who was running around in circles trailed with fire.

And his chaotic path was taking him directly into one of the piles of fusion coils. Realizing what would happen to the tower if the room ignited, Jess made a beeline for the teleporter, leaping into the air as she realized she wasn't going to make it in time. As she sailed through the air towards it, a thunderous roar louder than anything she had ever heard in her life erupted from the fusion coil room. A blinding flash consumed the control room, sending Jess flying forward, out of control.

Seconds later, she made contact with the teleporter. Blackness followed.


	14. LEMON SQUADRON

Silently, all of Yellow Team stared skyward, watching the three brilliant specks that flared against the darkening sky grow bigger by the second.

"Whoa..." Ryan breathed. "Those aren't Pelicans..."

"Of course not," Patton replied, pleasure easily discernible in his voice. "Lemon rides in style. Those are olives."

"Olives?" Ryan asked, confused.

"It's a corruption of an acronym," Clair explained helpfully. "O-L-A-V. Stands for Orbitally Launched Assault Vehicle."

"Oh. Like a drop pod."

The team fell silent again, The specks grew larger, details becoming clearer; three white-hot fireballs, each trailing a long line of heat like a comet. Within seconds, they were close enough for the sounds of their scorching decent to be picked up by the Yellow's audio sensors.

Patton glanced at them, then down at the ground, as if measuring something mentally.

"Back it up, team," he ordered. "OLAV drops aren't the most accurate thing ever. This is gonna be close."

Amber, Clair, and Ryan all hastily backed away from where they had been standing. Patton, after taking a moment to look back up at the approaching OLAV's, joined them.

Thirty seconds later, Lemon Squadron arrived. The drop pods slammed to earth seconds apart across an area of about five meters, throwing up three huge clouds of dirt and grass from their points of impact. Once on the ground, their design was easy to make out; a boxy body, with four pyramidal points arranged on the edges of the top part. These were smoking, indicating something had just been blasted free of them via an explosive charge.

Patton sighed, loud enough for the rest of his team to hear him.

"Ah, memories," he said. He sounded like he wanted to add something, but he was interrupted by a loud hissing that came from the OLAV's, followed by a trio of loud _bangs_ as more explosives blasted the front parts of the pod's body out and away.

Amber and Clair, who had been expecting this, only flinched slightly at the loudness of the blasts, but Ryan, who hadn't any idea this was coming, took a couple involuntarily steps back.

"Shit!" he cried. Patton simply chuckled, then turned back to the three OLAV's. Their interiors were obscured by the dust thrown up from their landing, but shadowy forms could be seen moving around within. In moments, they became visible; three soldiers, one from each OLAV.

All the Yellows except for Patton drew in breaths of surprise and awe.

The personnel of Lemon Squadron certainly looked every part as intimidating as their reputation suggested they were; instead of the standard-issue battle armor that most Yellows wore, their armor was sleeker and much more advanced, and was obviously loaded to the gills with spare ammunition. Even their helmets were different, sporting full-face black visors that Ryan couldn't help think resembled fishbowls.

Clair, Amber and Ryan all paused, staring in awe at the three new soldiers. Patton, however, simply walked towards the three new arrivals. He paused before the front of the group, then stepped back and saluted.

"Hester," he stated, dropping his hand from his helmet smartly.

"Patton," Hester replied. Her voice was female, cold and professional. "It's good to see you again."

"Likewise, ma'am." Patton paused, then did something none of the soldiers under his command excepted; he strode forward and embraced Hester. Even more surprising, she returned the hug, going so far as to boldly lift Patton a good half meter off the ground. Just as abruptly as they had started, the two broke apart, stepping back to their original positions. Silence reigned for a moment, both soldiers apparently lost in their own thoughts.

"So, you going to introduce us?" Hester asked, nodding her head towards the rest of Patton's team.

"Right." Patton turned to face his team. "Lemon, this is my squad. Captain Clair Sinclair, my second in command and our medic;"

"Hi." Clair said, waving. "Nice to meet you."

"Private First Class Amber Stone, our sniper;"

"It's a pleasure," Amber said happily.

"And Private Ryan Hobar, heavy weapons."

"Uh..." Ryan stuttered, at a loss for words. "You...kick ass, I guess?"

"That they do." Patton, finished with his team, turned back to Lemon. "Guys, this is part of my old team; General Hester Sharp, CO of Lemon Squadron;"

Hester nodded in response.

"Major Rodney 'Hearts' Hamilton, sniper;"

"Glad to be here," the soldier to Hester's right pleasantly. "And I must say, Pinkie, you have quite the fine team here." He made a noise like a camera clicking, directed at Amber and Clair.

"Pinkie?" Ryan muttered to himself. Patton ignored both the name and Ryan's question, and continued introductions.

"And finally, Sergeant Inez Lopez, electronics-"

"Not anymore." The third and last member of Lemon spoke up. Her voice was like Hester's, but...different. While Hester's was cold, Inez's was subzero, bordering on emotionless. It was fitting; for where her right arm should have been, there was only a bare metal prosthetic. "Not since Lucy."

"Oh." Patton's voice fell as well. "You're her replacement then."

"Yes."

Silence fell again, and Patton's team could feel that there was a great deal of sadness associated with this Lucy.

Patton's hands clenched tight around his shotgun, fingers absently running over the very name of the person he was remembering he had carved into the stock.

Hester, however, quickly snapped the group out of it.

"Alright, intros are done. What's the situation here?"

Patton, obviously very happy to move on from the depressing subject of the mysterious Lucy, snapped to attention again. "We're in deep shit," he stated. "We've got reliable intel that there's going to be a new force moving in on the Wilderness; calls itself the Red Army. But we don't know when, how or why."

"Do we have any intel on it at all? Troops numbers, equipment, vehicles..."

"Negative. Nothing." Strangely, Patton started chuckling to himself. "But that's why your here, right? When life gives you lemons..."

"Kick ass."

Hester and Patton slapped hands, then pulled each other close enough again to bump shoulder pads. They broke apart again.

"Anything else?" Hester inquired.

Patton thought, then added; "Yeah. There might be an AWOL Green soldier somewhere around here. We just saw him disobey orders and ride of on a Mongoose. But he shouldn't be too much of a threat. Last we saw, he was mostly naked and forced to carry his armor on the getaway vehicle."

"Really?" Hester asked. "What the hell was that about?"

"I'm not entirely sure myself," Patton answered. "Anyways, we need to do something about him before he starts trouble."

"Alright." Hester turned to Clair, Amber, and Ryan. "Listen up; here's how things are going to go here. As of now, I'm assuming overall command of this base and all personnel. You-" She pointed to Patton's team, "Will still follow Patton's orders, but you will answer to me as your CO. He is now my second in command. What I say overrides what he says. Clear?"

"Ma'am yes ma'am!" Patton's team shouted in unison, snapping to attention.

"Good." Hester turned to Patton. "Solid group you've got here." She said.

Patton nodded. "Yeah, they're good."

Hester grunted, then quickly started issuing orders. "First order of business; I want to know the lay of the land." She turned to Clair. "You have ATVs, I assume?"

"Yes ma'am." Clair replied quickly. "A Mongoose or two. They're inside. I can go retrieve them, if you want."

"Do it. Bring two."

"Wilco." Clair quickly headed inside the base. Hester turned to Amber and Ryan.

"I want you two on look out. Full gear; I want you loaded out with the heaviest weapons you can dig up from your armory."

"Can do," Amber replied.

"Can I ask a question?" Ryan said. Hester, after a moment, nodded.

"Go ahead."

"Does this mean hand-held weapons only? Cause I'm pretty sure we have a couple turrets and a SAM battery buried somewhere in the base."

"If you have them, get them," Hester stated. Ryan nodded, snapped another salute, and quickly hurried into the base. Seconds after he left, Clair came out, riding a Mongoose, towing the second ATV behind her.

"'Gooses are all yours," she said, hoping off. Hester nodded, then signaled to her team.

"Mount up," she ordered. Hearts and Inez quickly complied, climbing onto the second Mongoose. She turned to Patton.

"That means you as well," she stated.

Patton glanced at her, then at Hearts and Inez, and finally at his team, including Ryan and Amber, who had just emerged from the base carrying a large weapons locker.

"Copy that, ma'am," he said. Quickly, he mounted up the empty Mongoose with Hester and gunned the throttle. Behind him, Hearts and Inez followed. In seconds, they were out of sight.


	15. MASTER CHIEF

Jess slowly opened her eyes with a groan. When her vision cleared, she could see the other three Greens stood in front of her.

"You alright?" Skope asked her.

She slowly got to her feet, helped by Skope. "Yeah, I think. How long was I out?"

"Approximately two hundred and ten seconds," Nome answered. "Or rather, three point five minutes."

Jess looked around at their surroundings. The Greens were standing in a large room with walls that looked to be made of some strange metal, indented with glass and lights. It was almost entirely empty, save for several light blue arrowed circles that lined the very back of the room. The front wall of the room was gone, and looked out onto a brilliant view of what looked amazingly like (and what she hoped really was) the Halothrii Wilderness.

She turned and looked at the teleporter she had come through to see that it had been destroyed. The green light was gone, and a large area of the metal around it was blackened. She looked at the rest of her team. "What happened to the teleporter?"

"Right after you went through it, it just...exploded," Kenny said.

Jess then remembered how the tower was on the verge of a detonation right before she went through the teleporter, and the brutal force that had picked her up and hurled her into the teleporter. "Oh, right."

Nome elaborated: "The explosion in the tower would have destroyed the teleporter node there, which then severed the link between it and this node. I am afraid that we are, for the time being, trapped here, for the teleporter is now inoperable."

"Why couldn't you have just said 'it was broken'?" Kenny asked Nome. "Is there some reason you always feel you need to take the long road in the explanation, or do you just like the sound of your own voice?"

"I do not understand your question," Nome responded.

Kenny decided to let it drop. "Never mind."

"Where's Fred?" Skope asked, glancing around for the orange soldier.

Jess looked at the ground. "Last I saw of him, he was running around on fire in the fusion coil room, and then there was an explosion, and-" She paused. "Well, I'm pretty sure it's safe to say he's gone."  
"Kind of an awesome way to go out. though," said Kenny. "Taking a bunch of Reds with him by running into a pile of fusion coils."

"May he rest in peace," Nome mumbled solemnly.

Everyone fell silent for a long moment, which was eventually broken by Jess.

"Does anyone else find it odd that there was a speaker in the room with the fusion coils?" she asked. "I mean, really?"

"Yeah, that was a bit strange," Skope responded. "Actually, now that I think about it, that speaker looked like one of those ones our old commander used to give the base orders through."

"So, what? The Reds were taking orders from the fusion coils?" Jess asked jokingly.

"What if they _were_ taking orders from the fusion coils?" Kenny postulated, missing Jess's attempt at humor.

"Do not be daft, my comrade," Nome responded matter-of-factly. "Fusion coils do not have mouths, nor any internal organs, much less any way of thinking, and therefore cannot give orders. Although I cannot think of any other reason why there would be a speaker there. And that Red _did_ scream something about a 'council'. Hmmmmm…"

While Nome was in the middle of thinking, Skope looked up and noticed that Jess had been staring at something for a few seconds now, and followed her gaze to something up in the far corner of the room that had not been there before.

It floated there in the air, mostly spherical in shape, and had what looked like a large blue eye that it was facing them with. It looked for the most part like a metallic orb with a large singular eyepiece. Skope called to Nome and Kenny and pointed at the orb. The instant all four of them were staring at the orb, it suddenly zipped out of the room and out into the Wilderness faster than Skope had ever seen anything move before (with the exception of a sniper round).

"Whoa, where'd it go?" Kenny asked, sweeping side to side in a vain attempt to lay eyes on the strange apparition.

"I think it went outside," Skope answered. "It clearly didn't want us to notice it."

"And yet it was watching _us_ ," said Jess. "Weird." She shivered in her armor.

"Yet another peculiar entity in this strange universe," Nome remarked. "Will the wonders of this place never end?"

The Greens stood there for some more moments, looking at their surroundings. The silence was soon broken by Kenny, who voiced the thoughts of the rest of his team: "So, now what?"

Nome hmmmed in deep thought and looked around the room again. "There does not seem to be a way to exit this room. There are no doors, the only opening at all is a giant missing wall which leads out the side of a cliff of unknown height, and the teleporter from which we came in here is destroyed. All of this presents quite a complication, because it entails that we could be trapped here indefinitely."

"In other words: this sucks," Kenny confirmed. "Great."

"Uh, hey, the…thing…is back," Skope alerted everyone while pointing. They all looked up again, and sure enough the floating orb had returned to stare at them, apparently having appeared from nowhere. It gazed at them silently, making no motion other than to bob up and down in the air.

Jess decided to try waving. The orb seemed to track her arm, so she attempted talking. "Hello?" she asked hesitantly. "We don't want to hurt you."

"Yes, perhaps our best option is to try to communicate with it," Nome mumbled to himself. To the orb he shouted: "Greetings, creature of this strange land. We are in need of your assistance. You see, we have become trapped here with no way to leave this space. If you know of a way out, then I implore you to aid us in any way that you can."

The orb stared at them for a few more seconds and then approached them slowly. The Greens watched it closely as it neared them. The orb stopped as soon as it was directly above the four of them. And then, all of a sudden, what was apparently a Scorpion Tank appeared in front of the orb.

"What the hell?" Kenny exclaimed. "Where the fuck did that just come from?"

"Get out of the way immediately!" Nome shouted, referring to the fact that the tank was now falling towards them, released from whatever force had been holding up until then. Hastily, the Greens evaded out of the way, diving into practiced combat rolls that took them out from under the landing area of the tank, and with just a second to spare. The tank crashed harmlessly where they had been.

"This doesn't seem physically possible!" Jess cried, rising to her knees.

"It shouldn't be!" Nome declared. "And yet-"

"Heads!" Kenny howled.

Another tank appeared in front of the orb, and again the Greens had to evade roll out of the way. As the second tank hit the ground, Nome shouted up at the orb: "Why are you doing this to us? We have done nothing to harm you and mean you none, and yet you attempt to drop tanks on us!" Then he thought a moment and continued: "Are you perhaps stuck here as well? If this is the case, then perhaps we can help each other."

At that, the orb stopped.

"So then, it's trapped here as well?" Skope asked.

The orb seemed to nod, its one-eyed face moving up and down.

"The teleporter that took us here was labeled by the tower computer as 'preset destination'." Nome postulated. Following another theory, he asked the orb: "Are you working for the Reds? Have they trapped you here to do their labor?"

The orb nodded once more.

"Labor?" Kenny asked. "What labor is it doing?"

In response, the orb zoomed out to the doorway and looked at something floating in the air a few hundreds of meters from the edge of the empty space. The Greens followed its gaze and saw a giant metallic fortress that dominated that part of the sky and appeared to be floating on nothing at all, much like the platforms the Greens had encountered deep inside Red Base before all of this had happened.

"You built _that?_ " Jess asked the orb, amazed. "Wow, that must have taken weeks!"

For a third time, the orb nodded.

"Are the Reds going to inhabit this structure upon its completion?" asked Nome. Upon the orbs next nod, the medic then remarked: "My new comrade, you have great abilities indeed. It is an honor to have met you."

Now it was Kenny's turn to ask the orb a question. "Hey flying ball thingy? This place looks an awful lot like the Halothrii Wilderness, except that all the bases and stuff that were here have been replaced by other stuff. Is this really the Halothrii Wilderness, or another alternate universe with the same terrain?"

The orb did not respond.

"It does not appear to be able to use words," Nome observed. "Try asking it yes or no questions only."

Kenny thought for a moment, and then asked it: "Is this place the Halothrii Wilderness?"

The orb still did not respond, and Kenny was about to ask it another question when it suddenly gave a violent shake of its eye.

"It's not then, I guess," remarked Kenny. "We really are in a whole different universe then, huh?"

The orb nodded strongly.

"Do you have a name?" Skope asked.

The orb nodded.

"It cannot tell us, unfortunately," Nome stated. "Remember, it cannot use words. And yet it can understand us. Peculiar. Perhaps it has a pair of auditory organs, but no vocal ones."

"Well we should name it something," Kenny said. "Otherwise we'd just be calling it the floating ball thingy, which seems not quite right somehow. Or play twenty questions until we find out what it's really called…"

"A most unwanted waste of our time, to be certain." Nome agreed.

"Since it builds stuff, maybe we should call it 'Bob the Builder' or something like that," Jess suggested.

The orb shook its eye violently, to the point of actually moving back and forth slightly.

"Okay, I guess it doesn't like that." Jess shrugged.

"What about 'Cycloptic Metallic Levitating Sphere', or CMLS for short," Nome suggested. "Beautifully technical, and very descriptive."

The orb shook its head even more violently.

"There's a name I heard somewhere, but I can't quite remember where I got it from," Kenny mentioned. "But I think it sounds pretty cool. How about Master Chief?"

The orb nodded enthusiastically.

"Great, he likes it," Skope observed. "Guess its Master Chief then."

"You know, I'm pretty sure Master Chief's a rank," Jess noted. "I used to date a guy who said he was one."

"So then, do you know of any way that we can return to the universe from whence we came?" Nome asked the orb.

The orb shook its head dejectedly, if a floating orb can look dejected.

"Well the Reds are able to get in here somehow," Skope reasoned. "Master Chief, do you know of a way of getting to the Reds?"

The orb nodded and then flew over to the broken teleporter. It looked at the teleporter for a few seconds, and then all of a sudden the green light filled it again.

"He fixed it!" Jess exclaimed, pumping her fists. "Now we can finally get out of here!"

"But now that we have the teleporter back online, we need to decide where to take it to," Nome stated. He then turned to Master Chief. "Do you know how to reach the place where the Red Army originated?"

Master Chief nodded eagerly.

"The place where they originated?" Jess asked. "Why do you care about that? And why do you want to go there? Seems kind of stupid to me, really. I mean, we just ran from six of them. You want to go to a place where they came from?"

"Something has always struck me as odd about the Red Army," Nome revealed. "Within just a few days they formed themselves, they appear (through lack of any other conflicting information) to be serving a council of fusion coils, and that black shadow creature captured us for them. I am certain that something beyond our understanding, something dark and terrible, is behind all of this, and I believe that at present our best course of action is to discover all we can about exactly what is going on so that we can combat it effectively. We must strike this mystery at its heart, and perhaps then we will finally be able to discern a solution to it."

"A simple 'yes' would've sufficed," said Kenny.

The others thought Nome's words over for a few moments. Finally, Skope responded: "Yeah, maybe you're right. Getting back home would be nice, but considering how big this whole situation is, we need to get to the bottom of it."

"I agree," said Jess. "That, and if we find out how they got from wherever they started to us, we can do the same thing and get home!"

"Let's do it!" concurred Kenny.

Master Chief again turned to the teleporter to configure it. When the orb was done, an automated voice from the room sounded: "Teleporter configuration complete. Set destination: The Swirling Abyss of Absentmindedness. Warning: navigational hazard. Proceed at your own caution."

Jess looked at Master Chief. "Are you sure this is the way? It seems pretty dangerous."

Master Chief nodded.

"It may be dangerous, but it is along our path, and so we must traverse it," Nome stated.

"And besides, it's not like we haven't had to deal with hazards ever since we fell into this strange universe," commented Skope. "What's one more?"

"Well, let's not doddle any longer," said Kenny, cracking his knuckles. "I wanna get going."

Cautiously, the Greens entered the teleporter and began the next chapter in their strange journey.


	16. A NEW PRISONER

Hester's Mongoose led the party of Yellows as they searched for the missing Green soldier who had left his team. Patton remembered that he had headed towards the shoreline, taking the path through the cave to get there. He also remembered that the Greens had once occupied a base that would likely be somewhere in that area. Conversing with Hester as they drove, he reasoned that the missing Green, apparently being more tactically sound than his teammates, would almost certainly head there for shelter and supplies.

"How do you know the Greens have a base there?" Hester asked Patton. "We've had our ears to the ground for months and we didn't pick up anything solid."

"Through kind of a misunderstanding," Patton responded slowly, embarrassed to be discussing such a lame mission with his old CO. "About three days ago, the Greens –the original Greens, of course- confronted us because they thought we had destroyed one of their bases, which they said was up north. Furthermore, during my stays on Command, I've heard rumors of there being a Green base in that area. You guys probably heard the same ones. I think it's safe to conclude that it's the same one the Greens mentioned. Greens may be good at many things, but being unpredictable isn't one of them."

"Don't we know it," Hearts chuckled.

Hester nodded, acknowledging both soldiers. "Definitely seems worth checking out then, for the Green and to investigate their former base. It's not like we really have any other leads at the moment."

"Acknowledged," confirmed Patton. "I'll get us there."

By now the Yellows had reached the shoreline. Along a shallow sandbar they could see a small island, and just behind its shores lay a mostly cylindrical structure. The upper part of it consisted of a ring of stairs that served as a 360 degree lookout post, dotted with sentry positions now empty.

And parked outside of it was a lone Mongoose. The same one the Green had used to escape.

"I think we're here..." Hearts muttered, bringing his ATV to a stop. Patton parked his own Mongoose a meter ahead.

Inez stepped off her Mongoose and tapped the side of her helmet in a gesture Patton remembered performing a thousand times; quickly accessing the advanced sensors installed in all Yellow Squadron soldier's helmets.

"We're at the correct location sir," Inez informed Hester after a minute of scanning. "Base structure matches up with all known standard Green construction tendencies."

"Then let's get in there." Hester ordered "Go quiet."

The rest of Lemon, Patton included, followed her order, quickly slipping into a stealthy mindset and the two drivers quickly activating noise suppressors for their rides engines. Patton was the last to do so. An uneasy feeling rose in his chest as he readied himself. The last time he'd need to be stealthy, things had gone _very_ wrong...

He shoved the thoughts aside and drove forward.

Lemon traveled along the sandbar, running silent, then parked their vehicles alongside the Green Mongoose. Still silent, they dismounted, readied their weapons, and cautiously surrounded the door to the base. After a quick check of their back for any enemies and the area around them for booby traps, Patton (leading with his shotgun) slowly tested the door. It opened easily. As Lemon passed through behind Patton, it was easy to see the lock had been blasted clear of its place with a small breeching charge. If it was recent was harder to tell.

Once inside, Lemon Squadron took a quick look around.

"Excessive damage for regular combat," Inez noted calmly. She pointed out several charred cracks in the main room revealed that many explosions had happened in it. Nearly all of the walls that were still intact were coated in black soot, and one pillar in the room seemed ready to collapse. Lemon skirted this weakened support gingerly.

"This wasn't a fight..." Hearts muttered uneasily. "This was a slaughter."

"It appears that the Greens gave you a half truth," Hester told Patton. "The base itself wasn't destroyed, but everyone _inside_ of it definitely was."

"No bodies," Inez noted. She was right; the floor was clear except for debris from the walls and ceiling. But, as they looked one, Lemon could see empty spaces in the dust that resembled human forms. The Greens must have taken their casualties with them.

"Figures," Patton responded darkly, kneeling down to examine a rather large chunk of wall. "As if they would've told us _everything_ about what happened here. Couldn't let us know that the base was still standing and habitable, so instead they told us it no longer existed." He kicked the chunk softly and gave a grudging shrug. "Good thinking on their part. That's what I would've done."

"Boss," Hearts informed Hester. "I hear something."

Hester paused and clenched her fist over her head. The four Yellows stopped and listened.

Indeed, they could hear something. At the other end of the structure, they could hear the sound of someone grunting, as if exerting a lot of effort to get something into place. Slowly, Lemon inched towards the source of the sound.

Turning the corner, they found the source of the sound, and their objective. The Green Patton had seen earlier was still putting his armor back on. He had completed his leg and torso pieces, but was fighting to get his left arm into one of the sleeves, having apparently forgone the standard undersuit that most soldiers wore their armor plates on. Lemon watched him for what was probably about two minutes or so, making sure that there wasn't anyone or anything else in the room. After that, Hester cleared her throat loudly and the Green finally noticed them. When he did, he shot up with alert, sending armor pieces in all directions.

"Oh God, you followed me!" he exclaimed in annoyance, covering up his bare chest. "Didn't you already get your fill of humor watching me at your base?"

The Green took in a deep breath and then continued: "Look, right now, I'm annoyed, humiliated, tired, sore, and I need to get my armor on. Could you guys just...leave me alone for a few minutes and then come back?"

"No," Hester replied without hesitation.

There was a pause, broken only by Inez shifting to get a better look at one of the Green's armor pieces that had come to rest near her.

"You've come to take me prisoner, haven't you?" the Green asked.

In unison, the Yellows nodded.

The Green sighed, placed his palm over his eyes, and was about to get back to the process of putting his armor on, but then he hesitated. "How did you guys even find this place?" he asked. "This is a Green base, or at least it was before the attack. Why do you know about it?"

"We have our ways," said Patton. "Now come on. Get that armor on, or I'll have Lucy make you!" He cocked his shotgun for emphasis, making sure the hand-carved name on her stock showed to the Green.

"I really do need to get the rest of my armor on first," the Green countered. "It was difficult enough for me to get here carrying it. And if I go with you now I'll have to carry what I still haven't put in and it'll slow us down. It _is_ really heavy when it isn't powered up, you know."

Hearts sighed and turned to Hester. "Y'know sir, he does kind of have a point."

Patton found himself smiling. Ever since he'd known him, Hearts had never called Hester "ma'am." Something about not liking the idea of a female CO, he remembered.

Hester nodded after a moment of thought. To the Green she said: "Fine. You can put the rest on here. Just don't take too long." She paused again, then added in a voice laced with sadistic glee; "Oh, and if you were hoping that we'd leave you alone while you do it, think again. You are our prisoner now, and we aren't taking our eyes off of you until we've got you secure back at base."

"And maybe not even then," Patton elaborated, finally getting into the swing of working with his team again.

The Green sighed. "Fine. I'll try to get this done quickly. But no guarantees!" He continued his efforts to get his left arm into the armor sleeve.

Something nagged at the back of Patton's mind. Part of the conversation that had happened between this Green and his CO...

"So then, is your name really Not Kevin?" He asked the Green as he worked.

"Kevin Guinness, actually," he replied. "Private, Green Army."

"Then what was all that stuff about being the Ghost of Not Kevin or whatever?"

The Green paused for a moment, thinking, and then said: "I can't say I have the slightest idea, honestly. I've been wondering that a lot myself. I think it has something to do with me being unconscious last night, after you guys sent me flying with that rocket. When I woke up, the others on my team thought I was a zombie at first, but then I spoke and so they decided I was a ghost instead. The hell if I know why."

"Not the brightest bunch, are they?" Hearts asked Kevin, with a tinge of humor in his voice. "And here I thought everybody said Greens were smarter than us..."

"Which is understandably incorrect," Inez added coldly.

"Well, at least my team was, though I doubt the rest of my army is," Kevin responded thoughtfully. "Normally we Greens kick as. I just got stuck with the asshole team."

He paused, thinking again. "To be honest, they seem like Blues. I can't think of anyone else I've ever encountered who's that stupid. Not that I've met many people out here. I'm still a rookie. But they're still the dumbest people I've met."

"I'm with you on that." Patton agreed. "And that's saying something."

Kevin gave a heave, finally managing to secure his left arm in the sleeve, and while moving on to his right arm he stated: "You know, actually, maybe it's for the best that I'm your prisoner."

This surprised the Yellows, causing them to give variations of: "Oh?"

"I just can't stand the others on my team," Kevin elaborated. "Our leader, this asshole named Ferrero Rocher, always thought my name was Mr. Guy for some reason, even though I told him repeatedly that it's Kevin Guinness. And his second in command, this total nutjob named Frizbee Rezah, can't speak at all without climbing on top of something so that he can project his voice. "

"I remember him." Patton grumbled. He already knew all of this, having been told it by Rocher himself almost a day earlier, but he let the Green continue so as to fill in the rest of Lemon. "He's lucky I didn't order my sniper to take his head off."

Hearts gave a soft chuckle as he imagined Rezah climbing on a Warthog. Inez and Hester stayed quiet.

Kevin gave the Hearts a moment to finish chuckling and then continued: "The last guy on the team is a large mute guy named Mr. Boom. He's a weapon's specialist. He doesn't seem to care a whole lot about what's gone on-though I'm not sure I'd know even if he does 'cause he doesn't talk-but far as I can tell, all he does and thinks about is weapons and explosions."

"Reminds me of someone..." Patton muttered.

"That's quite the lineup," Hearts snickered again. "And here I thought we'd have a _challenge_."

Kevin concluded: "My point is, I feel better with you guys. Or to put it more accurately, you can't possibly be dumber than them."

Quietly, Patton sidled next to Inez and whispered: "You know, I kind of like this guy. Instead of resisting like any other Green would do, he's actually making a case for coming without a fight. If only all of our enemies were like him, this war would have ended a long time ago."

"But then we'd have no challenge," Inez countered. "And then where would the fun be?"

"Good point," revised Patton. "Still, at least he isn't fighting us right now."

"It's certainly helpful from a supplies standpoint." Inez replied.

Kevin finished fitting his right arm in its sleeve. Now all that remained was his helmet. He set it over his head, gave it a series of twists to lock its seals in place, and with that he had finished putting on his armor. Small lights burst to life along the armor's shell as its shield system came online and ran a self-diagnosis.

"Right," he informed Lemon. "I'm ready to go now."

Lemon escorted him out of the base. As they walked, Hearts made sure to show his sniper rifle off to Kevin, especially the customized scope attached to it and the hair-trigger. He even showcased his rather-impressive reloading skills, ejecting the current magazine in the weapon and slamming a new one home before the first had even fallen past his knee. He then promptly caught the falling mag with his foot and flipped it back into his hand.

"Just wanna make something clear-like; I don't miss," he casually informed the Green. "Run and you're dead."

Kevin nodded eying the rifle. "Understood."

Kevin and the Yellows exited the base. Hearts and Inez got on one Mongoose, the sniper's weapon aimed in the Green's general directions, Hester got on the second, and Patton and Kevin got on the third, with Patton riding in back so that he could keep Lucy trained on the back of the Green's head just in case he tried to pull anything. Lemon assembled quickly and professionally; they'd done this strategy many times before.

With that, they were off. The ride back was surprisingly uneventful; all the Green really did the whole way was look at the landscape and where he was going so that the ATV wouldn't flip, which probably would have ended with Patton unloading an 8-gauge magnum round into his skull.

In fact, it turned out that their stay at the Green base had not lasted long at all; by the time they returned to Yellow Base it was only 12:30 in the afternoon.

Lemon got out and entered the base, with Patton still keeping Lucy's barrel pointing directly at the back of Kevin's head. As they passed through, Patton noticed the large surface-to-air missile battery that now stood atop the base. Ryan must have assembled it while they were gone.

The walk down the many corridors of Yellows Base proved little more interesting than their journey outside. Or at least that was the case until someone came along. As they were nearing the holding cells, they encountered Ryan, who had been getting a tool to work on the Falcon and was heading back up to the warehouse. The instant he saw that Kevin was in custody, he shouted: "Yes, we've got him! Awesome!" He punched the air in excitement.

Lemon stiffened for a moment, then relaxed as they realized it was a friendly doing the shouting.

He walked up to Patton and asked him: "Hey, boss. Can I interrogate the Green about what happened outside the base and then put a recording of it on YellowTube? Amber just put that video of him stripping up and it's already beat out both that dancing fat guy and the cute big-eyed cat in views!"

Patton thought it over for a moment before replying: "Eh, I don't see why not."

Ryan pumped his fist in the air again. "Yes! One billion views, here we come!"

Kevin gave an annoyed sigh. "At least, I _thought_ you guys were more respectable then my team."

As if to give consolation, Patton told him: "He's just a little hyper right now because he saw you…well…you know what. As soon as he gets over what he saw-though I have no idea _when_ that will be-he'll get back to being the merciless weapons specialist that I sometimes have to force him to be."

"That's good," Kevin responded. "I guess?"

"Pinkie, what the hell was that?" Hearts asked in a low tone, so that Kevin couldn't overhear. "Didn't that seem just a little… _nice_ to you? Last I remembered, you'd more likely stab a prisoner than tell them anything about your team."

In a similar tone, Patton replied back, quiet enough that Kevin couldn't hear: "That would be for a hardened prisoner, like we used to deal with. This guy...isn't them. That, and when I interrogate him I need him to feel intimidated, and that effect is kind of hard to pull off if he thinks that I'm a useless nincompoop like the other members of his team. He's hardened to being yelled at by an idiot, obviously. At least this way he thinks I'm competent, though I am anyway. The other half of the trick is to make him think I'm his worst nightmare. And this helps with that too; now, he'll think I'm sort of a nice guy, and will be more relaxed. So when I start grilling him hard-"

Hearts nodded in recognition. "-the surprise will weaken his resistance. That's a good plan. Say, wasn't that the one you figured out just before you left us?"

"Yeah." Patton nodded. "And I've put it to use successfully several times since then."

By this point they had reached the holding cells. Using her robotic arm for extra strength, Inez shoved the Green into the nearest cell and Hearts sealed it with the control pad on its door. A trio of dull _booms_ indicated that the door's locks had engaged.

As he stood up, Kevin told the Yellows: "Uh, hey, just so you know; I intend to prove as useful an asset to you as possible, so that I can join you. Because the only other alternatives are being rescued by the Greens, in which case I'd have to go back to my old team-" he revised that as soon as Lemon (minus Inez) started snickering "-or being executed, neither of which I can say I'm particularly fond of. So, uh, if I could just join your army, that'd be great."

"Keep dreaming, you seaweed colored Green," Patton shouted at Kevin as he and Lemon left the chamber.

As he lowered the door to the chamber, he just barely overheard Kevin shouting "Well thanks for taking me hostage instead of killing me-"

The door shut completely. Patton leaned back against it, a sour tastes suddenly filling his mouth.

"You won't be thanking me after our first interrogation session," Patton responded rhetorically to the Green as he again cocked Lucy. Having overheard the Green's retort as well as Patton's response to it, the other members of Lemon Squadron stood in place for a moment, and then simultaneously burst out laughing in unison, Inez included. As they walked up to the sector of the base for personnel quarters, they continued discussing the Green and how blatantly humorous it was that he was thankful to be captured, then reminiscing about some of the other Green's they'd encountered during the time Patton had been with the team.

Their laughter became so loud that Clair could overhear it from her quarters, and it confirmed for her the bond between her boss and the other members of Lemon Squadron. It was the sound of four friends and teammates having finally gotten together after three years and having a good time.

It also made her wonder about the name Lucy. It was the name for Patton's shotgun, and yet the woman called Hester had expressly referred to this Lucy as being a former member of Lemon Squadron.

So how had the name come to be carved into the stock of Patton's weapon?

Clair couldn't help feeling as though there was far more to this Lucy then at first met the eye.


	17. THE INSPECTOR

Patton and the other three members of Lemon Squadron spent the next few hours patrolling the base while discussing the myriad events of late. Patton informed his friends of what had happened over the last four days while Inez, Hearts, and Hester told Patton stories of the many missions they had been on over the last three years without him. They eventually ended up sitting around the kitchen table drinking what passed for lemonade in Yellow Army front line units, a powdered drink better known as "carbonated piss". Hester was deep into her telling of the third mission in their conversation, a smash and grab deep behind Green lines, when the four of them were interrupted by Clair's sudden appearance. The medic cleared her throat with as much subtlety as she could without causing too much distraction, but just enough to be heard.

It was enough to get all of Lemon focusing on her with the reflexes born of multiple intense battles.

Patton reacted in a calmer fashion and turned slowly in her direction. "What is it, Captain?" He asked, addressing her by her rank in the presence of his own CO.

"Someone's at the door to our base."

"Sinclair, we've been over this. Let me again repeat the orders for the door: 'If it's a Blue, shoot them. If it's a Green, ask them what the hell they want and then shoot them. And if it's a Red, raise the alarm and then do everything in your power to kill them before they kill _you_.'"

Clair nodded quickly. "Yes sir, I remember. You were quite clear about door protocols. But it's a guy from our army."

Patton stopped as he understood. "Oh. Good thing you didn't shoot then."

Clair continued; "He says he's an inspector sent from Command who's come to look over the base and make sure everything is functioning as it should."

Patton quieted, surprised. _This_ was something he hadn't expected.

"Interesting," Hester commented, obviously intrigued. "Do you normally get inspectors here?"

Patton shook his head. "No. I can't even remember the last time one showed up. But maybe that's an indication that it's about time. Sinclair, let the guy in and tell him that we'll see to him in a few minutes." He turned back to Hester, offering her more fake lemonade when he noticed her glass was empty. "Now then, where were we?"

Clair left Lemon Squadron to finish their conversation and went to the canyon base entrance where the inspector was waiting. After reaching the entrance room, she opened the base door to greet him.

The man standing before her wore a firm suit of armor with a distinctly darker tint then she was accustomed to seeing. The color was still yellow enough to call yellow, but with a kind of brownish hue, as though a slight bit of purple had been mixed in with the yellow paint when the armor was coated.

And then Clair's eyes reached the soldier's helmet. The first word that came to her mind was "fishbowl." The visor covered so much of the soldier's helmet that it formed an almost hemisphere, and looked rather fragile. It was the same kind of helmet the Blues wore, and she was used to seeing it, but to find a member of her own army wearing it caught her slightly by surprise. It also kind of looked like the ones that Lemon Squadron wore too…except that their visors were less hemispherical, and looking into theirs made Clair feel intimidated. Looking at this one made her want to laugh.

His armor was quite unorthodox for a Yellow, to say the least. She realized that she had been staring at the soldier for a few seconds, and politely asked "You must be the inspector, yes?"

The soldier nodded. "Indeed I am," he then replied with deep and authoritative voice. He certainly sounded like an inspector.

Clair motioned for him to come inside. "Welcome to our base, sir. I'm Captain Clair Sinclair."

"A pleasure to meet you, Captain."

The soldier stepped inside and looked around. After observing the room for a moment, he informed Clair: "I won't be long. I just need to take a look around your base and make sure that everything is functioning properly. Are you the base commander?"

Clair shook her head, a little confused. "No. I'm the medic. Commander Patton will be with us in a few minutes. He's just finishing up something. Well, actually, General Hester is our base commander, but my team still answers to Patton as well as her."

The inspector nodded. "So, give me more detail about this change in command."

"Some of Lemon Squadron has taken up post here. And since they're higher ranked then us, they get command of all personnel. Standard operating procedure."

"And how many personnel total are we talking about, exactly?"

Clair counted on her fingers. "Well, there's the three people who came in from Lemon Squadron. There's also me, Patton, Private Hobar, and Private Stone, who were originally here. Oh, and Brian, whose defection has just been green lighted by command. That makes eight."

"Defection?" the inspector asked curiously.

"He was a Blue that we captured," Clair informed the inspector. "He defected to our side after a recent battle."

"You captured a Blue?" the inspector asked. He seemed genuinely surprised. "But why? Their only real strength is in numbers. Individually, they are weak. I see no tactical advantage to accepting the defection of one."

"That's mostly true...except for this one," Clair corrected. "He showed survival skills when we encountered him, and he's managed to live through a couple nasty fights before he joined up. He may be the only Blue to do so that's ever been seen in this entire war." After saying this, Clair paused. The inspector should have been briefed on these developments before coming here, yet he clearly had not known about Brian. Though this inspector was who he said he was (as he had flashed his ID at her in the door camera when he had arrived, and it had checked out). Perhaps he was just overworked. Or under-informed; Bradley _had_ said that news of Brian's defection would be kept quiet for security reasons.

Just to make sure, Clair asked him: "How do you not know about this yet? Weren't you supposed to be briefed at Command?"

With a seemingly practiced ease, the inspector replied: "Of course. But I want to know how you personally feel about things happening at this base. I need to psychologically evaluate everyone here to ensure that everything is going as it should. The mental state of the soldiers in a base is as important as the physical state of the base itself." Pausing from his staring around the room, he then made direct visor contact with Clair. "Forget what I know. Just tell me everything you know as if I were new to the base without any prior knowledge of its workings."

Clair nodded. "Right, of course, Inspector. I should have guessed."

The inspector shrugged. "Quite all right. Now, then, did you say that you were the medic? How's that job going for you?"

"Fine," Clair responded. "Of course, the fix-its can get a little frustrating sometimes."

"Fix-its?" the inspector asked, obviously interested.

"Yeah, I'm also serving as the mechanic. Hobar helps me out with that a bit, but I'm the main go-to person whenever something needs to be repaired."

"So then, you have multiple jobs."

Clair nodded. "Ain't that the truth. I'm also the cook, and need to have food prepared for meal times. Though that really isn't really that hard."

" _Three_ jobs. Interesting…"

"Brian helps me out with some of the cooking duties," Clair elaborated. "Though he used to be a Blue, and I usually have to stop him from burning the kitchen down whenever he tries to help."

"Medical, food preparation, and mechanical duties are all headed by you. How do you manage all of this?"

Clair thought for a moment. "Well, _manage_ is sort of the right word. There are times when I just want to bash someone's skull in, like yesterday at dinner when Brian tried microwaving his loaded magnum and the bullets in its magazine cooked off and started flying all over the kitchen. Had to patch him up _and_ fix the microwave too. And I also have to deal with the stress, which can be really hard. But this base is still standing, so at least in my view I'm making things work. And I'm not doing everything all the time. Usually it's just fixing mechanical stuff and cooking. We haven't had any serious injuries here in a while."

She turned and noticed that the inspector was filling something out on his tacpad. He soon finished whatever it was, and then looked up at her again. "That concludes all of my questions for you, Captain. Now then, would you care to show me around the base?"

"I think we can to that just as well," Patton's voice interrupted. Clair turned to see him and Hester in the door to the hallway.

"Commander Patton and General Hester?" the inspector asked.

Patton nodded. "I'm Patton, she's Hester."

"Ah, I'm glad to meet you both." The inspector held out his hand. Both Patton and Hester looked down at it, then Hester tentatively shook it. Clair guessed they were both more comfortable with saluting. The altercation proved something Clair had been mulling over; the inspector was obviously from a civilian walk of life. A proper military inspector would have salute, just as Hester and Patton had expected.

"Follow me. I'll show you around." Hester turned and calmly marched down the hallway she'd come from. She signaled for Patton to follow her, which he did, leaving Clair slightly bewildered and wondering what to do now.

The three Yellow's walked quickly through the base. Hester (Patton could obviously see) wanted to get this inspection done as fast as possible. Undoubtedly, she wanted to get back to "real work". Honestly, he felt the same way. Though he also wouldn't have minded spending a bit more time catching up with his old CO...

The inspector looked around, taking notes on his tacpad and nodding in approval as everything he saw was well within Yellow Army standard parameters. Patton mostly stayed quiet, only jumping in to provide some small bit of information that Hester didn't know. Which actually didn't happen often; Hester had lived up to Lemon Squadron's meticulous intel standards by thoroughly researching his base before coming here.

After about an hour of exploring the base, the inspector completed the circuit of his tour and ended up where he had begun: in the entrance room.

"That about clears things up," the inspector confirmed while reaching out to shake Patton's and Hester's hands respectively.

"So then, how does our base look?" Patton asked him.

"Well, everything seems almost functional."

"Almost?" Patton and Hester replied in unison, the former sounding surprised and the latter concerned.

"Lieutenant Sinclair mentioned to me that she serves as the medic, mechanic, and the cook, despite only having the official role of medic."

"Yeah…that's true," said Patton slowly. "She _is_ the best one for those jobs."

The inspector sighed. "From my evaluation of her, I can conclude that she is both stressed and overworked, with the former being caused by the latter. She has too many duties and too little time and energy with which to do them."

"Well, maybe she does get a little stressed out sometimes," Patton remarked. "But she's making it work, or so I should think."

The inspector shook his head. "Regulations mandate that one duty is given to one soldier, no more. In order to ensure that all tasks at this base are done properly, another member must be added to your team; a mechanic. I will notify Command of this and they will send someone here within the next 12 hours."

Patton nodded, not unhappy with this turn of events. "Fine. One more member can't hurt."

"And we'll have more help for defense when the Reds arrive," Hester commented. "That will work fine."

The inspector nodded. "Well then, good day to both of you." He began walking to his Mongoose.

As Hester and Patton watched him go, the inspector sped off towards the shoreline.

 _That's odd,_ Patton thought to himself. _The teleporter to Command is in the other direction. Eh. Perhaps he's just taking a scenic route. This landscape is pretty nice to look at._

He decided to dismiss the thought. He turned to Hester. "Well, that was interesting."

Hester nodded. "Damn right. Now then, shall I go back to telling you about that mission?"

"Sure thing." The two of them disappeared back inside the base, heading off to rejoin the rest of Lemon Squadron at the kitchen table.


	18. THE SWIRLING ABYSS OF ABSENTMINDEDNESS

As Skope stepped last out of the teleporter behind Master Chief and the other Greens, he shielded his eyes, at first believing that his new surroundings were too bright for him. But after a few seconds he revised his assessment, realizing that by now his helmet's visor would have modified its brightness filters to shade out the light. Rather, what he saw was a fuzzy blurriness, as though he were looking at everything through a thin layer of dirty water. He was able to make out some of the surroundings nearest him. They were standing on a featureless metallic platform that extended in all directions as far as he could see.

Above him was a strange spectacle: giant structures slowly swirled above the Greens in random formations, creating the look of some strange invisible tornado that had sucked everything up from the ground. There was no eye of the storm; the structures seemed to revolve around many different vortices spread out in the sky as far as he could see.

"If this isn't the Swirling Abyss of Absentmindedness, then I don't know what is," exclaimed Kenny, obviously awed.

"The light in this region is difficult to see in," Nome commented. "The teleporter was right to warn us of this place; it is indeed a navigational hazard. I can only hope that our new friend is capable of preventing us from getting lost."

Master Chief flew in front of the Greens and nodded vigorously. After that, it slowly began moving due south (according to the compass on Nome's assault rifle, though he didn't trust it very much in this place), making sure to give the Greens enough time to keep up with it.

"At least Master Chief knows where to go," Skope said with as much confidence as he could muster.

The other Greens nodded, and without further pause the four of them began following the cyclopean floating metal sphere. They followed Master Chief for what seemed like hours, though it was impossible to be sure since the time keeping programs on the their HUDs had stopped functioning ever since the events at Red Base. As they walked, Jess pulled out her media player. She had used up most of its remaining battery life while they were stuck in the pit, but there was still some power remaining, and she figured that now was a good a time as any to use it for every last second of its worth.

As the Greens continued on their journey the platform seemed to go on forever, it became clear that this landscape was made almost entirely of it, minus the objects swirling in the air above them.

"How long does this go on for?" Kenny finally asked out of boredom. "Master Chief, are you sure we're going in the right direction?"

The orb stopped, nodded, and then continued on.

"I just hope I don't get old doing this," Kenny continued. "This would be a really sucky way to use up your years."

"I unfortunately have no way of knowing how far this platform goes on," Nome postulated. "For this universe would appear to defy nearly all conventional laws of physics."

"No shit." Jess muttered, glancing up at the kaleidoscopic cloud of locations shifting above their head.

"Yeah, that was amazingly helpful," Skope remarked sarcastically.

"Are you sure?" Nome asked Skope, completely failing to pick up on his cynicism. "Perhaps I am more resourceful then I give myself credit for."

A little bit later, the last amount of battery power on Jess's media was finally spent, and with nothing better to do she looked up at the sky while it recharged from her armor's power supply. A couple of moments later she commented: "You know, the structures above us do resemble some of the maps we were on earlier."

"Hmm, you think?" Kenny asked. "I didn't see anything familiar."

"Yeah." She pointed at one, which was floating just above the Greens. "That looks like the building that housed the hockey arena. Only, it's much more crudely done, like a first rendition of it or something."

Now it was Skope's turn to point. "Hey, yeah! See there? That looks almost like the tower we were in when being chased by the Reds."

"A half built one, maybe," said Kenny.

It was true; the building Skope indicated seemed to be relatively unfinished.

"That's my point," Skope elaborated. "It's like a version of it that was only half completed, or maybe scrapped."

"Hmmmmmmm," Nome thought to himself out loud. "Perhaps they are versions of previous maps that were discarded for some unknown reason. The members of the Clan of the Pissed-Off Raspberry mentioned that they could create maps somehow, and that they were easy to create. Which would mean that there must be many maps being made. But for every map that gets realized, there must be dozens that never get finalized. The mass of deleted ones must go somewhere. Perhaps this realm is meant to house the remains of all trashed or outdated map ideas, much like a junkyard for cars."

"That's an interesting theory," said Jess. "And it actually makes a lot of sense...kinda."

"Hypothesis, actually," Nome corrected. "Theories are based on a multitude of evidence, unfortunately far more then we currently have."

"Fine, hypothesis," Jess revised. "It still seems pretty plausible, though."

Nome turned and noted that Master Chief was nodding vigorously. "Master Chief seems to believe that I am very correct."

The orb continued nodding.

"Well, it seems to know more about this universe then we do, so I say we should trust its word," Skope stated.

"More like its nod," Kenny added quietly.

Nome nodded. "We are having it lead us through an otherwise unnavigable realm already. We have little choice but to trust it at this point."

The Greens continued to follow Master Chief through the peculiar landscape. After what seemed like another hour of walking, but may have just been minutes, the Greens spotted something at the fringes of their vision range.

Skope pointed in the direction of the object. "Hey, check it out. I think I see something over there."

As they got closer to it, Jess observed: "It's one of the structures from the sky. Looks like it fell to the ground for some reason." The structure was small; a two story building with one room on either level and a walkway ramp connecting both of them.

"It seems mostly intact," Skope mentioned. "We could use it as shelter."

"Sounds fine to me. We've been walking for…like, forever," Kenny complained. "Let's call it a day, shall we?"

"Regaining our strength is a superb idea." Nome agreed. "We should set up camp here as best we can with what we have."

The Greens cautiously entered the structure, not knowing exactly what to expect. Upon determining that it was clear, they began the setup of a makeshift living space. Nome used some of the debris around the structure to cover its windows and provide insulation against whatever might be outside. Master Chief helped with this effort, proving that it could effortlessly lift massive objects and set them in the correct orientations with no trouble. None of the Greens had any idea how it was able to do this, but considering that they had seen it create a tank out of thin air they were ready to believe just about anything. And they weren't about to complain either.

While Nome and Master Chief were working on the windows, Skope took out his helmet lamp and set it on its metallic swivel so that it could serve as a lantern of sorts.

Once everything was set up, the Greens sat in a circle, with Master Chief hovering near the ceiling. The dismounted headlight from Skope's helmet was indeed a good makeshift lamp; it lit up the entire room, dimly, but enough to see by.

"It's been a hell of a day, hasn't it?" reminisced Kenny, crossing his legs with a groan.

"That seems an accurate enough description," agreed Nome.

"I hope we get out of here soon," said Jess longingly. "This place is so freaking weird."

"I believe that once we reach the Reds we will discover a way back to our universe," Nome explained. "Because they were able to get into our universe, that means they must have a way of getting from here to there-"

"Which means that when we get to the Reds we get to a way back home," Skope finished for him.

"Exactly. Well, at least that is the theory."

"Not a hypothesis?" Kenny asked.

"We do have some evidence for this, thus making it a theory," replied Nome.

"Right, sure. Whatever," said Kenny. He leaned back and crossed his arms under his head.

"Yeah, well, I'm tired," yawned Jess. "For now I think we should all get some sleep."

"Indeed," agreed Nome. "We have spent the majority of this day walking through this wasteland, and we will need all of our strength for whatever is coming next."

The Greens set up on the most comfortable positions in the room that they could manage. Then Skope turned off the lamp, and they all began their attempts at going to sleep. It took awhile, but soon everyone had drifted from consciousness, with the exception of Master Chief, who continued to watch over them.

* * *

A short figure waited on the edge of a platform, staring at a fortress that was quickly coming under construction. Though not as he had planned. The Monitor assigned to the task of building it had somehow managed to escape the confines of this map despite the constraints put upon it.

More than likely it had left with the help of the same Greens that had destroyed the Council's tower. So now he had to use the Reds to finish his fortresses construction. It was working, just half as quickly as it otherwise might have. The figure shuddered with rage. Damn those Greens! Damn them!

Behind him a Red soldier approached.

Slowly, the figure turned. "Have you found them yet?"

"We have, my lord," the Red soldier replied. "They are currently resting in an outpost near the center of the Swirling Abyss of Absentmindedness."

"They made it that far?" the figure exclaimed. "Excellent. They must be weak from the journey. However, we cannot afford for them to get any further; if they do reach the center of the Abyss then they may discover the true origins of this army, and we cannot afford that. They must be dealt with!"

"By what means, my lord?" the Red inquired cautiously. "We have acquired several new implements of destruction that you might wish to test upon them..."

"Yes...I know just the thing." The figure thought a moment before replying deeply: "Send in the bomb."

* * *

Since their timing programs were nonfunctional, the Greens had no alarm system for waking up. Fortunately, Nome seemed to have a good sense of time, and he awakened the others when he believed it to be eight hours since they'd gone to sleep. Kenny Groaned as he got up. "Morning already?"

Looking around and noticing that the light outside was exactly the same as when they had gone to sleep, Jess commented: "Do day and night effects have any significance here?"

"Most likely not," Nome answered. "Though if I look outside I may be able to discern specific differences in the light as it hits the ground. I should do that."

"Um, okay," Jess replied. She turned to Skope. "What is he doing?"

"Only he knows," said Skope. He reached down and picked up his headlamp before installing it back into his helmet. When he looked up, he saw Nome coming back into the room rather hurriedly.

Once in the doorway, Nome stood nervously still. "I do not mean to cause any panic or alarm…"

The Greens stared at him.

"Okay," replied Kenny slowly. "Then don't."

"…But there is a giant bomb standing outside of this structure."

The Greens jumped into action. "What?" they shouted in unison.

Nome led them back outside. A giant metallic box sat directly in front of the door. It was large enough to create a shadow over all of them from whatever it was that was lighting up the sky, as well as the entirety of the structure. Thousands of small tubes and wires went to and fro all over its surface, and a giant smiley face symbol was on the side facing them.

"?" Kenny asked quickly, taking a surprised step back.

Master Chief did a double take in the air as soon as it laid eye on the massive object.

"I'm picking up concentrated radiation from it," Jess informed everyone. "It's definitely radioactive."

"It's larger then our _base!_ " Skope exclaimed. "Is this not overkill?"

"And what's with the smiley face?" asked Kenny.

As if on cue, the smiley face symbol lit up, and the bomb emitted a noise that sounded like: "Oh, hiiiiiii. I'm happy!"

The Greens turned and stared at each other. Skope loudly wondered: "Oh my God, did it just talk?"


	19. THE NEW RECRUIT

In the Halothrii Wilderness, the sun was beginning to set behind the eastern canyon wall. Patton stood in the warehouse watching it, while behind him Ryan worked on the Falcon's repairs. The sound of his power drill echoed through the warehouse.

Patton was in deep thought about the supposedly imminent Red Army attack. He had fully expected it to happen by now. Since Steve's warning, the Reds had had ample time to strike, and more. And yet...they had not. Had Steve lied, like the Brown had? Patton certainly wouldn't put it past the Red, though his response during his interrogation at Blue Base Iota had seemed more than genuine enough. Patton then shook his head, realizing what was probably going on. _The Reds must be toying with us, waiting for us to lull ourselves into a false sense of security before they attack. Well it won't work on me, and it won't work on my team._

The Yellow Commander's thoughts were interrupted by the beeping of his COM. "Yes, what is it?" he bellowed into the device.

On the other end was Clair. "Sir, someone's at the canyon entrance structure. I think it might be the new recruit that the inspector said would arrive."

"Very well," said Patton. "Make sure it really is him, then let him in. I'll be there in a moment."

"Yessir." His COM winked off.

Patton took another minute to finish up his thoughts over recent events, then casually made his way to the canyon entrance. As he passed through the crew quarters sector of the base, he went by Amber's room. He could see her sitting on her bed, staring at the fusion coil again. _I really hope she hasn't lost it,_ he thought to himself. _She's been spending_ way _too much time with that fusion coil._

* * *

Amber noticed Patton pass by as well. She briefly looked up at him, and as soon as her commander had left she turned her attention back to Vincent. She had been deep in conversation with it (she still wasn't sure if fusion coils had genders) before Patton had wandered by. She knew that Patton didn't believe her about Vincent's ability to talk, and so now she just tried to keep it secret until she convinced Vincent to help her prove it. Which so far he had been unwilling to do.

"So then, where'd you go off to a few bit ago?" she asked the fusion coil. "I couldn't find you anywhere in the base for a couple of hours, and now you're back here. I know you were somewhere else. I practically turned the base upside down looking for you."

"Yes, I was," Vincent admitted. "But it wasn't anything important."

"Then how about you tell me?"

Vincent hesitated. "I'd rather not. I just had some business to attend to, that's all. Like I said, nothing important, or interesting for that matter."

"What kind of business?" She was going to make Vincent tell her. He was a fusion coil, and she was dying to know what kind of "business" a fusion coil could possibly have to take care of.

"Well, recently some guys have been quite a nuisance to me," Vincent explained, hesitantly. "I had to deal with them, and then…pick up the pieces, as it were."

"Huh," Amber responded, not sure what to do with the rather vague answer Vincent had given her. She decided to leave the subject for now, since the fusion coil obviously didn't want to talk about it. She'd pursue it at a later time.

* * *

Patton arrived at the canyon entrance just as Clair was opening the door to the new recruit. The recruit wore light tannish colored armor, still yellow but of an odd hue. But fortunately not as odd as the inspector had seemed; his visor was the standard model for Yellows, as was the tech on the rest of his armor.

Clair motioned the recruit to come inside. "Please, do come in."

Patton reached out to shake the soldier's hand. "You must be the new recruit."

The soldier nodded and took Patton's hand. "Yes sir. The name's Joshua Wilson," he informed Patton with a tone of strong pride. "Pleased to meet you, Commander."

"Likewise," Patton responded in turn. "I assume you know why you're here."

Wilson nodded. "To assist your medic in the other duties you had assigned her, such as mechanic duties as well as food preparation. Though fixing stuff is my main job."

 _He's well informed,_ Patton analyzed. _That's always a good sign._

Clair shook Wilson's hand as well. "I'm Clair. You'll be helping me out, I guess."

Wilson nodded. "Ah, wonderful."

"So then, shall we show you around the base?" Patton asked him.

Wilson nodded. "Of course, Commander. Of course. Lead the way."

Patton and Clair gave Wilson a tour of the base in much the same route as they had taken the inspector earlier. The new recruit commented on each location they passed, eventually striking up a rather deep conversation with Clair about the latest engineering breakthroughs made by the armies towards the construction and post-delivery modification of LRVs. In fact, Wilson seemed to know a lot about them then even she did. Understandable, considering his specialty.

It was as though the base he'd come from had been several years more down the road in terms of technological advancement. This made for quite a bit of banter between the two of them, as Clair quickly learned about many new tricks to building and fixing things that she had not known before and would find quite useful. She was clearly happy that someone was finally able to help her with all of her duties, and Patton noted that it was also extremely good luck that they were friendly towards each other, since they would be working together a lot of the time.

While heading for the crew quarters, they passed Amber and Ryan as they were coming through the hall from the other direction. They stopped as soon as they nearly ran into each other. "Oh, hey boss," said Ryan. "Is this the new recruit guy that the inspector was talking about earlier?"

Wilson shook each of their hands as he introduced himself to them.

"Pleased to meet you," Amber responded, making a mental note of how polite and gentile he was.

Clair put in: "He's really knowledgeable about mechanical workings. I can tell that we're going to work well together. He's told me a neat little trick that I can use to get a full ten percent increase in the fuel efficiency of the Falcon's engine, as well as…" She went on, rattling off a long list of mechanical details.

 _Wow, this guy really turns her on,_ Patton mentally noted. _She sounds like a little kid in a mechanic's shop. Like Hobar with heavy weapons, except for fix-it stuff._

"Sounds useful," remarked Amber. "Definitely glad we have someone who can do that on this team." She paused, then added, "Hey, when you get the chance, could you look over my thermal scope? It's been getting fuzzy recently."

"Sure." Wilson said cheerfully. Amber nodded in appreciation.

They retreated back into the residential sector of the base so that Wilson could pick out his quarters. As it so happened, there was exactly one room remaining in the base that had yet to be occupied (a few days ago there had been several, but since Brian and Lemon Squadron had moved in they were now taken as well). Clair kept up her conversation with Wilson as he began setting up in his new room. Meanwhile, the other Yellows went on to do other things; Ryan went to finish maintaining and loading one of his rocket launchers, Amber headed to the upper levels to monitor the recent security feeds for any sign of the Red Army Attack, and Patton headed for the kitchen to find the rest of Lemon Squadron and let them know that Wilson had arrived, and maybe grab some more carbonated piss and a sandwich.

 _We've built up quite a team for when the Red assault force arrives,_ Patton thought to himself. _We may never be truly ready for a battle this desperate, but now at least I know we can give 'em hell and take a shit-ton of them with us._ He then revised that thought. _Or maybe we slaughter all of them before they know what hit them._

Patton knew that that was what he would like to think would happen. And maybe he should have hope. It was a luxury he'd never really allowed himself since Green Day, and now that the war had gotten so much more complicated he figured that of all the times to have hope, this was the time.


	20. HAPPY THE GIANT BOMB

The Greens stared at the giant bomb in front of them that had apparently just greeted them. They waited a moment, but no more sounds occurred. A short minute ticked by while the Greens continued to stare. Master Chief reacted the most dramatically: it erratically flew around the giant bomb, as if it was trying to do something to the bomb but couldn't. It eventually gave up and returned to its place next to the Greens. Skope was just about to pass the sound off the sound as a trick of the wind when suddenly a second sound reverberated over to him from the large contraption.

"I HAVE FREINDS!" the bomb bellowed, loud enough to make the listening soldier's organs shake. The Greens jumped.

"Ohmygod, it really does talk," exclaimed Kenny, stepping back in surprise.

"Hello," Nome replied cautiously to the bomb. "If you are truly sentient, then I bed you greeting."

"HIIIIII," the bomb gleefully replied.

Again, the Greens exchanged looks between each other.

"So, are we all, like, friends now or something?" Kenny asked the bomb.

The bomb became ecstatic. "I LOVE MEETING NEW PEOPLE!"

"Whoa, guys, its rad levels just spiked!" Jess exclaimed. Indeed, the sounds of a radiation counter could be heard clicking over the COM.

"You know, maybe making friends with a giant bomb isn't such a good idea," Skope suggested. "'Cause we might get blown up and all."

"'Vaporized' would be a more appropriate term," Nome noted. "Judging by its size, this bomb's power must be in the teratons."

"OHH," the bomb exclaimed disappointedly. Its face glow dimmed as it appeared to lose much of its happy energy.

"Huh, now their dropping." said Jess. "That's no weird in any way."

"Hmmmmmm," Nome thought to himself aloud. "Let me test a hypothesis."

To the bomb he said calmly: "We all want to be friends with you because we like you so much."

"Dude, are you, like, gay or something?" Kenny asked Nome quietly. Nome ignored it.

To Nome's comment, the bomb responded: "YAAAAAY!" Its face light glowed brightly again, as the bomb was clearly returning to an ecstatically hyper state.

"Rad spike!" Jess warned.

"That proves it!" Nome exclaimed, straightening.

The other three Greens, as well as Master Chief, turned to face Nome.

"Proves what?" Skope asked.

"Proves that the bomb's radiation levels directly correlate to how happy it is," said Nome matter-of-factly.

"That definitely agrees with what I've seen from my radiation counter," agreed Jess.

"So, let me get this straight," requested Kenny. "The happier the bomb is, the more likely it is to explode?"

"In simplest terms, that is correct," Nome confirmed.

"Sheesh. And I thought this trip couldn't get any weirder." Kenny muttered.

"Which means that for our survival, we have to make the bomb depressed," Skope realized. He turned to the bomb and shouted at it, rather convincingly: "We all hate you and don't want to be your friends anymore!"

"AWWWWW!" the bomb exclaimed, its face light dimming to the point that it barely emitted any light at all.

"It's working," confirmed Jess. "Rads dropping to near zero."

"Whoa, that was good!" Kenny noted. "How'd you get that angry?"

"You don't want to know," Skope growled. "Just…everything that's happened."

"So, now what?" Jess asked Nome. "The bomb may no longer be in immediate danger of exploding, but even so we still have a giant bomb sitting in front of our base, and I don't know about you, but that still makes me kind of nervous."  
Nome _hmmmmed_ to himself before admitting: "It appears that the only way to keep this bomb from going off is to keep it depressed. We must say things to it that will degrade its temperament."

Kenny, who until this point had been at the very far back of the group, walked up to the bomb.

"Spiked kittens!" he exclaimed.

"W-what?" the bomb asked, sounding horrified.

"Spiked kittens!" Kenny repeated. "Evil kittens covered in really pointy spikes that try to kill people because they hate the world!"

"That's so…sad," the bomb replied slowly.

"Radiation levels are still stable at near zero," Jess reported. "No, scratch that...wait, this can't be right. They just went _below_ zero. I'm getting _negative_ radiation readings."

"So where the hell did you come up with that?" Skope asked Kenny.

Kenny shrugged. "We needed something depressing, so I just decided to say the first dark thing that came to my mind. I mean, who wouldn't be depressed at the thought of spiked kittens?"

Skope nodded. "That's a good point."

It was now Nome's turn to approach the bomb. "That is enough about spiked kittens," he informed the bomb. "We shall move onto something else."

"That's good," said the bomb. "I don't like thinking about spiked kittens very much."

"Careful..." Jess warned, eyes riveted on her radiation counter.

"Now we are going to talk about Hell," said Nome. He said it calmly, as if he were instead going to discuss his plans for lunch.

"Well, that doesn't sound very pleasant either," the bomb commented darkly. Jess gave a thumbs up.

Nome continued: "Indeed, it is not. In the poem Dante's Inferno, there are deemed to be nine levels of Hell. The first is Limbo, where souls who never saw the Light gather in sorrow and loneliness for all eternity."

"So...dark…" said the bomb. Then its face light lit up a bit, and it asked: "If Hell has multiple levels, does that mean that it has a shell structure?"

Nome thought for a moment. "It was never truly specified, but I suppose that Dante's vision of Hell _could_ be spherical. If I may ask, what-"

"Then it must have a creamy center, like a fancy chocolate!" the bomb exclaimed, its face light now gleaming brightly.

"Rads are spiking again!" Jess warned.

"There are no creamy centers in Hell!" Nome said quickly and authoratively. "It is a place where people in the afterlife are sent to suffer of the sins they committed in life. It would not make any sense for it to have a creamy center. Unless, of course, the creamy substance was liquid sin itself and those trapped souls drowned in their own misdoings. But the poem makes no mention of that."

"Oooh," the bomb dejectedly replied, its face light dimming again.

"Okay, it's low and stable again," Jess informed everyone. She let out a breath.

"That was damn close," Kenny sighed.

"Okay, this is not going to work." Skope stated. "We have to do something about this bomb permanently. We can't just keep standing around it hoping that it stays depressed."

"Nor can we simply leave it," said Nome. "It is powerful enough to take out this entire realm, and if we abandon it then it may be able to cheer itself up on its own-"

"And that would be very bad," Jess finished.

"Well what the heck are we supposed to do then?" Kenny asked. "It's not like we can just pick it up and take it with us-" He stopped as he saw a sight that made him eat his own words. Master Chief, who had been floating around their heads during the exchange, flew in close to the bomb, and ever so gently the bomb lifted off of the ground as if it weighed nothing.

"Well, fuck me!" Kenny exclaimed. "What can't that thing carry?"

"I'm really glad we made friends with that thing," said Skope. "It's turning out to be a really useful companion."

"I'M FLYING!" the bomb exclaimed. "THIS IS WONDERFUL. I'VE ALWAYS WANTED TO DO THIS!"

Nome immediately went to attention. "You are actually falling. It is an optical illusion."

"THEN WHY DOES IT LOOK LIKE I'M HIGHER THEN I WAS BEFORE?"

"Becauuuuuuse…" Nome had to think for a second. "Because you are so tall already that you cannot tell the difference. Additionally, as you lack eyes, I doubt you have any true depth perception."

"Oh," said the bomb. However, its face light was still glowing brilliantly, and a warning look from Jess confirmed that the bomb was still not convinced that it wasn't floating.

"Spiked kittens!" Kenny exclaimed. "Lots and lots of spiked kittens! A field of spiked kittens, all killing things!"

He motioned for Skope and Jess to join him in the chant, and soon the three of them had joined into a chorus of "Spiked kittens! Spiked kittens! Spiked kittens!"

It took a minute, but soon the bomb had returned to its radioactively stable, depressed state.

"I believe we have found a reliable method of keeping the bomb stable," Nome reported. "We should continue moving to our objective now. I doubt this location is safe anymore."

The Greens began moving, with Nome leading in the proper direction, followed by Master Chief and the bomb. Surrounding were accompanied by Jess, Kenny and Skope, who were now fully utilizing the strategy of shouting "Spiked kittens!" at the bomb to keep it depressed every time it noticed something interesting. Which, thankfully, there were few and far between in the emptiness of the Abyss.

Once again, the Greens journeyed through the strange and oddly calm Abyss of Absentmindedness. Nome continued to rely on his carbine's compass to lead the group, as Master Chief was preoccupied in his task of carrying Happy the Giant Bomb, as Kenny quickly titled it.

The group sojourned through the realm for another hour. Finally, Nome began to notice signs that they might be getting close to the center of this world. The previously omnipresent glare obscuring the Green's vision had begun to fade, and the swirling object above them were beginning to lessen as well. They were approaching what Nome guessed to be the eye of the storm.

Then all four of the Greens stopped as they came upon what distinguished the center of the Abyss from its surroundings. Long ominous pillars jutted up from the ground with a height that put the tallness of the Green's base entrance structure in their original universe to shame. A forest of them rose up for as far as the Greens could see in the southern direction.

"This place creeps me out a little bit," said Jess quietly, gripping her carbine for reassurance.

"Should help keep the bomb depressed," replied Kenny. "I've been shouting 'spiked kittens' so much _I'm_ starting to get depressed."

As the Greens continued foreword, the forest of giant obelisks slowly became more concentrated, until it became a complicated task to fit the bomb through in some places. Just as it was beginning to seem near impossible to get the bomb any further, the Greens came upon what could only be the true center of the Abyss of Absentmindedness.

A ring of obelisks turned on their sides surrounded a field of swirling colored lights. The lights seemed to be confined to the circle of sided obelisks. And there was emotion as well, somehow. The whole place was tinged with sadness, as though some terrible outcome had happened here. Indeed, darkness seemed to surround this place, for the forest of obelisks casts menacing shadows through the odd glare of what equated to sunlight that came from the realm's sky. It put fear into the hearts of the Greens who, up until that point, had been rather neutral about their whole crazy trip.

Nome turned to face Master Chief, who in anticipation of such a conversation temporarily set down Happy.

"We asked you to lead us to where the Reds originated from," Nome stated. "Is this really that place?"

Master Chief gave a diligent nod.

"But this can't be where the Reds came from!" interjected Kenny, gazing into the swirling colors. "There's no one here!"

"Hmmmmm, yes, this is rather curious, is it not?" Nome hmmmed subtly to himself, looking out over the center himself.

"Those lights floating around look like they might have come from something," commented Skope. "You think there might have been some kind of fight here?"

"At this point I'd say anything's possible," said Jess. "Though I'm not picking up any radiation from those lights. Whatever they are, they aren't bombs. At least, not radioactive ones."

"Thank God," said Kenny. "But still, how the hell did the Reds come from this place? Doesn't look like the starting place for _anything_."

"Or did something from this place create them?" Jess asked rhetorically. She pointed upwards. "The tops of those weird block things; There's something up there."

"Yeah, I see it." Skope looked skyward and took a closer look with the magnification software in his helmet. "Looks like structures of some kind. There might have been a people that once lived here."

"And then something came along and made them into the Red Army," Kenny finished for him.

"Or the Red's came along and wiped them out," Jess suggested.

"Though these light remnants must have something to do with that happened as well," said Nome. "Perhaps there was a fight here. Perhaps that led to the creation of the Red Army…somehow."

Skope scanned the tops of the obelisks as he would high surroundings with his magnifier, making note of every detail. As with earlier, there were structures above them. Most appeared to be small living quarters, but in places there were far larger structures as well, with sources connecting bridges to the other structures. These had clearly been higher functioning locations in the time when this place was inhabited.

"Whoever is behind this subjected the people who lived in this place into his army," he stated. "Or wiped them out. I'm liking what I'm seeing about the Red Army's origins less and less the more we find."

Nome seemed as though he was about to say something more, but suddenly stopped and looked over Skope's shoulder. Skope turned and followed his gaze to see something, or rather a lot of somethings, on the horizon.

"Oh, crap," exclaimed Kenny when he too learned what was coming. One of the last things they expected to see in this universe; four Falcons, as well as four odd flying vehicles that looked like giant teardrops with wings. They were fashioned of the same dark purple coating as previous vehicles they had seen, giving them a sinister, insect-like look.

A voice sounded from one of the speakers on the Falcons: "The enemy has discovered the Genesis Point. Maximum priority alert! Repeat, destroy enemies at all costs!"

"Guys, it might be running time again," Jess said as calmly as she could manage given the situation.

With no more hesitation, the Greens moved as quickly as possible (the bomb made some maneuvering difficult) into the forest of obelisks as machine gun fire began to hail at their previous location.


	21. BREACH OF PROTOCOL

Patton and the rest of Lemon Squadron, gathered again around the kitchen table, were once again discussing previous missions (due in part to his former team mate's habit of telling _everything_ ) when Clair came and informed Patton that yet _again_ someone was at the canyon base entrance.

 _Good Lord, who could it possibly be this time?_ he wondered.

He excused himself with a curse and followed Clair as she led him along the route to the canyon base entrance, grabbing Lucy from her place at his side as he did.

"I'm beginning to lose track of the number of times someone's been at the door today," he commented. "Let's hope this is the last one. You check who it is?"

"It's the chocolate name guy," said Clair. "No idea what he wants, though."

Patton cocked Lucy. "Whatever the hell it is, it better be really good. I'm not in a merciful mood. He's either going to be a funny as hell Green or a dead as hell Green."

They reached the door and Clair hit the control pad to open it. They could see that the sun had gone behind the eastern canyon wall. Shadows of great length crept up the canyon. Standing in the doorway was indeed the commanding officer of the Green replacement team, Ferrero Rocher. In his hands he held what looked like a tray of muffins of some kind.

Patton gave the Green his traditional greeting; a shotgun barrel in the face and a bark of "What the hell do you want?"

The Green hesitated for some seconds and then replied: "I…I came to apologize for this morning."

"Apologize?" Patton, stopped, shocked. _This_ he hadn't been expectiong.

Then he laughed. "Apologize? But why? That was the funniest thing I've ever seen in a long time. I should be thanking you."

The Green shrugged off Patton's comment and continued: "To make up for it I made blueberry muffins." He held out the tray to the two Yellows.

Clair hesitantly took one and gave it an analysis, looking it over with the practiced eye of both a cook and a medic. "Looks good to me." She took a small bite, chewed thoughtfully. "Boss, these are actually really good!" She quickly grabbed the tray from Rocher. "Well take 'em. And thanks."

Deciding to rush to the point, Rocher said: "I just wanted to say that I'm sorry-"

"You made us muffins. Good muffins, according to Sinclair," Interrupted Patton. "Which means you get to survive this encounter. Now have a nice evening, and fuck off before I change my mind and shoot you. Bye!" He hit the control panel, and the door slammed shut in the Green's face. "Moron," he mumbled under his breath.

"Yeah, that was pretty dumb," agreed Clair. "But at least we got muffins out of it."

"Sure thing," concurred Patton before taking a bite of a muffin for himself. "Mmmm, you're right, these are good. Think I'll go take some to Hobar and Stone. And maybe that new guy too."

"Just save one. I wanna see how he made it."

Patton paused.

"You wanna reverse engineer a muffin?" He asked. "Is that even possible?"

"Entirely." Clair shrugged. Patton returned the motion.

Clair went back to the monitoring room while Patton headed back to the kitchen, took a minute to finally finish up the last words of this conversation with the rest of Lemon (which had been going on for many times more than long enough by this point anyways), and then went to the warehouse to see how the progress on the Falcon upgrades was going. He chewed on the muffin as he went, enjoying the lingering warmth from it's recent baking.

As he entered the large room he saw the new recruit, Wilson, and Amber standing behind Ryan, who was at a laptop. Patton approached them slowly so that he could take a look at what they were doing before they noticed him. Eventually managing to get behind them, he saw that they were looking at something on YellowTube.

He recognized it instantly; it was the video of the Green taking off his armor that Ryan had posted much earlier in the day. To Patton's amazement, the video had already garnered 59,049 hits.

_Nearly 60 grand in views, and in less than a day after it was posted! Damn, this incident was even more hilarious then I thought._

At the moment the other three Yellows in the room were watching the video for what was probably the umpteenth time and laughing loudly. None of them realized that their CO was standing behind them until Patton cleared his throat. The instant he did the others snapped to attention.

"Boss, hi," Ryan gave as his usual greeting whenever Patton had been watching him without him knowing it. "What's up?"

"As I remember, you were all supposed to be working on the Falcon," Patton recalled. How's that been going?"

"Ah, yes, the Falcon," Wilson said. "We've made a lot of improvements to it. Let me show you." He motioned over to the Falcon, and Patton followed his gaze. "We refitted the air intakes and fuel injection system to increase fuel efficiency, just like I told you we could do earlier," Wilson explained. "We also replaced the ammo in the gun turrets with a lighter round type that can travel faster and deal a lot more damage. It's also a smaller than standard rounds, so we can fit more ammo into each gun."

"Yeah, Wilson introduced us to it. It's great stuff." Amber said. "Never seen it before, but it works beautiful."

"Is it something you brought with you from Command?" Patton asked Wilson.

"Um…yeah," Wilson replied hesitantly.

"Then why haven't I heard about this?"

Wilson stopped dead for a second before quickly replying: "Uh, because it just came out right before I left. Yeah, just an hour before. They gave me the schematics before they shipped me out. Perfect luck."

"Hmh," Patton thought aloud. Something about the new recruit's answer seemed insincere, but it was still plausible enough that Patton had no problem buying it. After all, new things were invented at Command every day, but most didn't see standard use for months, if that. Ryan had exploited this the very first time he had been at Command, three days earlier. In fact, the weapons specialist still had several prototypes sitting in his quarters that he had "borrowed" from the orbital space station.

"And I think that's all we've had time to do so far," Amber informed her CO. "Because after we finished reloading the turrets is when we decided to show Wilson the YellowTube video about the thing this morning, and since then, well…"

Patton nodded. "As long as the Falcon upgrades get completed by the end of today, that's fine. Nearly sixty thousand views though, that's kind of amazing."

Ryan nodded. "Yeah, it's kinda scary how popular it is. It's already beat out that dancing fat guy, that weird frog thing, and that chorus of kittens singing the Star Wars theme. We even beat Catception!"

Patton grumbled in surprise at that last point. "Who would have known a stripping Green was funnier than cats planting ideas in people's heads." Then Patton remembered the other thing he had come to the warehouse to do. He motioned to Amber. "Stone, could you come with me for a moment?"

Amber nodded. "Sure boss." She followed him into the hallway. "What's up?"

Patton slung Lucy over his back and crossed his arms. _How should I say this?_ He cleared his throat. "Um, recently, I've noticed that you've been talking to a fusion coil."

Amber nodded, as if this was perfectly normal news to her. "Yeah, Vincent. He does talk. I really should have you meet him." She led Patton to her quarters, a minute's walk away.

 _Please don't let her be nuts,_ Patton prayed silently to no deity in particular. _Please don't let her be nuts!_

They walked into her room and she took out the fusion coil. "Now, Vincent, I know that you're a little shy around other people, but c'mon. It's time to introduce yourself."

The fusion coil did nothing except glow, something not unusual for a coil to do.

 _Oh, no,_ thought Patton. _She really has lost it. But perhaps I can still shake the sanity back into her..._

He pulled Lucy from her place on his back and held the shotgun at the ready to make himself seem as authoritative as possible. "Stone, this is going to stop now. I don't know if this is some kind of weird joke you're trying to pull or if you're psychologically compromised, but whatever the reason you have to stop this."

"Look, I can explain-" Amber started.

"Make it fast then." Patton growled. "Or I'll use this coil as a test dummy for the new solid slugs Hester brought with her."

He inserted a round into Lucy and coked her for dramatic impact. And then something odd happened.

The fusion coil began to glow brighter than normal, making itself seem almost like a desk lamp, and without warning Lucy shot out of Patton's hands (an impressive event considering his possessive grip on the weapon) and stuck to the fusion coil, along with several other metallic objects in the room that happened to be laying in the open, including Amber's dogtags, which literally flew from her neck. Patton reached out to grab Lucy, which was stuck quite solidly to the coil.

"What the fuck?" he murmured. "This is weird. Must have increased its magnetic polarity somehow. Probably defective." After a couple moments of struggling he finally managed to pry Lucy from the surface of the fusion coil and then quickly slung her onto his back before he lost the shotgun again to the magnetic pull of the coil.

"You know what?" he said to Amber while taking out his magnum, which was lighter and less subject to the magnetic field due to its hard chrome plating. "Forget explanations. This has gone far enough. I'm destroying this coil here and now-"

"It's a tape recorder." Amber interjected.

"What?"

"It's a tape recorder," Amber said again. "I placed one inside of the coil so that when I record audio logs it feels more natural, like I'm talking to a person. I doing them the way you're supposed to and...it just didn't work." She scratched her neck and looked sheepish. "And then, uh, I got more into it I guess, and I ended up named the fusion coil Vincent."

"Oh." Patton let out a relieved sigh and lowered his pistol. "Oh, is _that_ what's been going on?"

Amber nodded. "It was all just an exercise. Sorry if it got too far."

"That's good," said Patton. "'Cause for a while there I was beginning to wonder if you were compromised."

Amber laughed nervously. "No, definitely not."

"Good. You're the best sniper I know. I'd hate to lose you." Patton sighed explosively and straightened. "Well, I'm glad we got that sorted out. Carry on, Stone." Patton exited her quarters and paced down the hallway with an easy strut, covering his unease with professionalism.

As Patton walked away, the coil's glow dimmed again and the metallic objects still stuck to it fell to the floor with a series of _tinkles_.

As soon as her CO was out of earshot, Amber turned to Vincent and shouted at him: "Why wouldn't you say anything?"

"I need to maintain my cover in this base above all else," Vincent replied matter-of-factly.

"But he almost killed you!" Amber exclaimed. "And I had to lie to him to stop him from destroying you. If you'd said at least something-"

"I have powers far beyond your comprehension," said Vincent smugly. "I could easily have destroyed him before he could so much as touch me."

"What do you mean?"

"I was given a mission to observe someone at this base, and I am going to continue with that objective no matter the cost to you or your team."

"Why do you have to be so cryptic all the time?" Amber growled. "You disappear off to who knows where several times a day, keep mentioning things that you say are 'beyond my comprehension', and refuse to talk to anyone but me. Why can't you just be-" She just barely stopped herself from saying _why can't you just be a normal talking fusion coil,_ having realized how stupid a sentence that would have been.

"Look," said Vincent bluntly. "All you need to know is that I am taking residence at this base for a very important purpose and that I am vastly more powerful then you are, no offense."

"Fine," Amber growled again, then stomped out of her quarters and began walking back to the warehouse, having had more than enough annoyance for one conversation.

"But you better start changing, or we'll see how 'powerful' you are against a sniper round."

* * *

Patton was heading towards the security monitoring room to check up on things when he encountered Hearts in the hallway, calmly leaning against one of the walls. Lemon Squadron's sniper motioned to Patton that he needed to talk.

"Hey Pinkie, gotta tell you something." He said quietly.

Patton conformed to Heart's walk in seconds, old training returning to his mind. "Yeah, what's up?"

"Well, that guy who used to be a Blue. Brian, I think his name is."

"That's the guy. What about him?"

"The thing is," Hearts hesitated, not entirely sure how to say what was next. "I'm not sure he's entirely all right. I mean, aside from being a Blue and all."

"What do you mean then?"

"Well, last I saw him, he kept going on about how he thought this fusion coil was always staring at him, and even following him. In fact, he told me this fucking weird story about how last night this fusion coil actually went up to him in his bed and said some pretty odd stuff." Hearts shrugged. "I dunno, it was probably just some sugar induced fantasy dream of his, but I just think he needs attention."

Patton nodded. "Yeah, well, he's under my command. You let me worry about it. Still, thanks for the tip."

Hearts nodded. "Sure thing, Patton. No intel is bad intel, right?"

"No intel is bad intel," Patton replied.

The two of them reached a junction in the hallway and they went their separate ways. It looked as though Hearts was heading down to the lower levels to interrogate the Green prisoner. Or possibly get more lemonade. Both rooms were in the same area.

Patton simply bumped fists with him and turned off.

As he headed for security, Patton went over in his mind what Hearts had said.

 _Now it's the_ Blue _who's talking about this coil. Maybe Stone's story rubbed off on him? He's certainly impressionable enough. No, the Blue's barely been around her today. It probably is the tape recorder thing like Stone said. Still, something strange is definitely going on here._

A minute or so later Patton completed his walk to the security monitoring room. He entered to find Wilson looking at some of the monitors.

_Now that's a little odd. He doesn't have clearance to be in here._

Wilson continued to stare at the monitors, completely oblivious to Patton's presence. After a couple tens of seconds Patton cleared his throat loudly. Wilson jumped and upset the chair he was sitting in.

"How did you get in here?" Patton asked him firmly. "Weren't you just in the warehouse working on the Falcon?"

"Ah, yes, hello Commander," Wilson replied nervously. "I was just, um…"

"This room is classified above your clearance level," Patton elaborated.

Now it was Wilson's turn to clear his throat, though after doing so he suddenly became less nervous, perhaps managing to get his bearings over the surprise of this encounter. "I…got lost. Yes, I got lost in the central access corridor when I had to get something. I realized that you just showed me around this base a few hours ago, but it's just so big and-"

"The central access corridor is one straight long path," interrupted Patton. "It was built to help people avoid getting lost. How could you get lost from one path?"

Wilson stopped. "You know, I really should get going now," he stammered. "Lots to do on the Falcon." He started for the door, but Patton stepped in his way, crossing his arms. He actually had to look down on Wilson, he noticed. The new soldier was a head shorter than him.

"I'll escort you back to the warehouse, make sure you don't get lost again." He said, voice icy.

Wilson shook his head. "No, that's not necessary sir. I was using the camera feeds to look over the base layout. I think I can find my way now."

"I'll escort you back to the warehouse." This time, Patton made it clear it was not a suggestion.

Reluctantly, Wilson nodded. "Yes, fine."

They walked slowly back to the warehouse. Wilson continued to make certain excuses every now and then about why he should be allowed to go by himself, but Patton sternly refused to let him. In going into the security monitoring room without permission he had committed a severe breach of military protocol and Patton was going to make damn sure that it didn't happen again. The recruit was still just on his first day, and he didn't want to have him court marshaled _that_ early.

When they arrived back at the warehouse, Amber and Ryan walked back over to him, as well as Clair, who had recently begun helping on the repairs also. "Wilson, where've you been?" Ryan asked. "I turn my back, and you're just gone."

"He was in the security monitoring room," Patton explained.

"Are you sure boss?" Ryan asked. "I'm not sure recruits have clearance to go in there. Hell, _I_ don't have clearance to go in there."

"They don't," Patton confirmed. "And I think you just earned yourself the right to."

"I had to get something and got lost, then went into security so that I could use the camera feeds to see the layout of the base," Wilson elaborated.

"That area is restricted," said Clair firmly. "You shouldn't do that again."

Wilson nodded. "Fine, I won't. Don't worry."

"Wait, how'd you get past the lock?" Amber asked. Patton spun to face Wilson. That was a good question; the locks on the security room were some of the best in the Yellow Army.

"The door wasn't closed," Wilson explained. Patton glowered, but accepted the explanation. It wouldn't be the first time this happened. The security room door was supposed to close and lock by itself, but more often than not the computer code to start the mechanism failed. Yellow Command was working on a software patch, but it was low on their priority list. Patton made a mental note to ask them to hurry it up.

With that subject taken care of, the group resumed work on the Falcon, with the help of Wilson. Staying back to watch them (Wilson in particular) Patton made note of the team he had built.

 _He's very new and kind of dumb in terms of following protocol, but skilled enough that he's definitely an asset to the team,_ Patton decided.

Still, if the recruit decided to breach protocol like that again, then there would be consequences.

Even so, he was impressed with Wilson's abilities. Even from here, without flying it, Patton could see the Falcon was much more efficient and powerful then it had been a few hours ago, before Wilson had arrived. And once he had finished working on the Falcon, there were lots of other things he could have the recruit work on, like improving the damage for the many weapon prototypes the Hobar had borrowed from Yellow Command and fix the minor glitches they had picked up. All in all, a good man, and part of a good team. And maybe, just maybe, able to withstand the Red's assault, when it finally decided to come…


	22. THE WAY BACK

The Greens rushed through the glade of obelisk trees as carbine fire from the Red soldiers perusing them whipped by their suits. Some of the rounds connected, but fortunately the range between the Reds and Greens ate up most of the small-caliber round's momentum and the Green's energy shields prevented any permanent damage.

Suddenly the group came to a halt despite the bullets still flying by. Nome turned back to face the monitor. "Master Chief, what is the problem?"

"Looks like the bombs stuck," Skope answered in the monitor's place. Sure enough, the explosive device was wedged between two of the obelisks, bumping into them every time the monitor tried to force it through.

"They're catching up!" Kenny shouted, indicated the Reds who were closing quickly.

"Yes, we can see that," said Skope. He and Nome tried desperately to push the bomb through the two obelisks it was stuck in, but it still refused to move.

"The shatterpoint move," Nome said through breaths as he futilely tried to whack the bomb free with his hands. "It is not working!"

By now the Reds had caught up. Before the Greens could do anything more, their enemies had formed a perimeter around them, carbines raised and new magazines loading for those who had run out.

"Hands up," a Red with large shoulder pads, probably their commanding officer, shouted at the Greens.

"That's it then," Jess sighed anxiously, hesitantly raising her hands. "We're done for."

"Ready, aim…" the Red CO ordered his troops. In traditional firing squad fashion, his forces responded, standing abreast of each other and aiming their rifles in synchronization.

"It's been nice knowing you guys," Kenny said to everyone. "Even you, Happy-" Looking at the bomb, he realized that one of the obelisks it had been stuck between, as well as Master Chief, had disappeared. He looked around wildly. "Huh, where'd you-"

CRASH

One side of the Red perimeter became squashed under the missing obelisk, which simply appeared out of thin air without warning. Above them flew Master Chief, spinning in celebration of its kill.

"I knew it was a good idea to make friends with that thing," said Skope.

The Reds responded to this turn of events by decomposing their ordered formation into complete chaos, firing randomly at the Greens and the monitor and even the obelisk that had crushed their teammates. Master Chief picked up another obelisk and hurled it at the Reds.

"This is our chance, guys!" shouted Jess. "Let's get out of here!"

"Copy that!" Skope agreed.

The Greens turned to run, only to find another platoon of Reds coming in from that direction on three more Falcons. Chain gun rounds slammed into the ground ahead of them from the VTOL craft's guns.

"Dammit, they're everywhere!" Skope shouted, skidding to a stop. "How the fuck are we going to get out of here now?"

Scanning the area frantically, he noticed that Nome was Hmmmmmmming while looking in the direction of the swirling light orbs, back at the very center of the obelisk forest.

"Nome, what in the universe are you doing?" he shouted at the medic.

"Follow me," was Nome's only response. He began jogging back towards the swirling light orbs.

The other three Greens looked at each other, and with nothing else to do besides die to the Reds, began following him. The area around the swirling light orbs was covered by Red troops from the first platoon, who were still trying to shoot down Master Chief. They were doing a rather pathetic job. In addition to the monitors small size and incredible speed, it was fighting back. In just the last thirty seconds or so, the cycloptic metal orb had somehow managed to drop everything from more obelisks to tanks to Warthogs, several large blocks made out of something none of the Greens had seen before, and even trees onto the Red soldiers. Nome selected a path that most efficiently circumnavigated as many enemy forces as possible before reaching the swirling light orbs.

To the Greens, he said: "I believe that spatial distortions are the reason these objects are behaving the way that they are. If this is the case then may be possible to use them somehow to open up a portal back into our universe."

A third platoon of Reds arrived, this time supported by Scorpion Tanks. Two of them, as well as at least a dozen foot soldiers, were heading straight for the Greens. Despite all of its efforts, even Master Chief was overwhelmed by the sheer numbers of Reds. It fell back, barely dodging a 90mm tank round.

Nome was still in the process of looking the swirling light orbs over when a blast from the other Scorpion, hitting one of the nearby obelisk trees, knocked him and the other Greens to the ground. It didn't take a tactical genius to realize that for the Greens, the situation had gone from bad to worse to straight to hell in a flaming hand basket.

In sheer desperation, Master Chief began using Happy the Giant Bomb as some sort of giant club, swinging it at the Reds. However, this was made difficult by the fact that the metal orb itself had to constantly dodge the shots that all of the Reds were firing at it. One of the Reds not involved with trying to shoot down the monitor, holding a rocket launcher, fired in the Greens direction. Yet again, they had to dodge for their lives.

"Nome, whatever you're going to do, do it now!" Kenny screamed, blindly firing his carbine over one of the trees Master Chief had been using earlier.

"There is no time for caution anymore," Nome shouted with obvious and severe annoyance. He took out his pistol, pointed it at the centermost of the swirling light orbs, and fired repeatedly at it until his mag ran dry.

The area of the light orbs exploded. The force of the outburst knocked over all of the obelisk trees in the immediate area and threw everyone in range to the ground. For what seemed like the umpteenth time in the last hour, the Greens picked themselves hastily off of their feet. In the place of the light orbs was now a single massive sphere of white light which was quickly shrinking. Nome hit some scanner like program on his tacpad which emitted something into the light, glanced at the reading, then motioned to the other Greens, as well as Master Chief, to follow him before hurling himself into the light. The rest of his team did so without hesitation, dodging weapons fire of all sizes. Master Chief flew into it just after the Greens, dragging Happy with him.

There was a brilliant flash of light, a sudden swirling, dropping motion, and then the Greens found themselves in what appeared to be the very bottom of a large underground chamber similar in construction to a missile silo or reinforced spacecraft launch facility. The walls were made of stone or concrete and everything was lit by florescent ceiling lights. Looking up, they could see two floors of concrete walkways above them, with some gas vent off to the side which looked as though it might be used to carry inhabitants to higher levels. But that was not the most interesting thing.

Standing in front on the Greens, but with their backs to them, were three soldiers in orange armor. The Greens looked at each other, wondering the exact same thing:

As of when had there been an _Orange_ Army?

One of the members of the Orange group turned around and gave a shout when he saw the Greens plus a metallic floating thing and a huge bomb. The others whirled around.

"I thought you said this place was abandoned!" one of the soldiers shouted at another as all three pulled out their sidearms.

"It was!" the other shouted back. "The Green Army was all supposed to have left here a long time ago!"

"Well that turned out to be bullshit, didn't it?" the third Orange put in. He pointed at the Greens. "Waste them!"

"Oh fuck, not this again!" Kenny shouted in exasperation as, yet again, the Greens had to duck from gunfire. Fortunately, the orb of white light had not yet completely vanished, though it was getting smaller and obviously more unstable by the second. Nome made some last second calibrations to the scanning device his tacpad, emitting more energy into the light, and then he, the Greens, the orb, and the bomb followed him through once again.

This time the ride was rougher. In addition to the swirl and sink, there was a feeling like they were in an earthquake, without having any solid ground to stand on.

With another flash of light, the group came to a stop, crashing to the ground.

The Greens rose to their feet and looked around, instantly recognizing their surroundings.

"Finally! We're back!" Skope exclaimed. They were in the familiar canyon again, and just thirty meters from them was their real base entrance structure.

Kenny looked backwards to see the light portal shrink and fizzle into nothingness. "Portal's gone," he informed the others.

"That matters not, now," Nome stated. "We have finally returned, and I have no intention of using it again." He turned to Master Chief and told him: "This is our base. We are safe here."

In response, Master Chief set down the bomb. 'Set' was an interesting word to use to describe it, because apparently Master Chief's version of setting something on the ground is simply to drop it. And when something as massive as Happy the Giant Bomb hit the ground it created reverberations that shook everything. Loose chunks fell off the base structure, the trees near them shed a cloud of leaves and needles, and a small landslide rolled down the cliff on the other side of the canyon.

The Greens nearly lost their footing, though even if they had it would have meant little because of everything else that had happened in the recent past.

"Set it down _gently_ next time, will you?" Jess scolded the flying metal orb.

"Yeah, you could set if off it you jar it to much!" Kenny added.

"Did anyone think that what we saw just before getting back here was slightly peculiar?" Nome asked.

"You mean the Orange soldiers?" Skope asked. "Yeah, that was odd. And that silo or whatever it was…they said that where that place was somewhere that our Army abandoned. And old base, maybe?"

"I don't really care," said Jess. "I'm just glad to be back."

* * *

Patton was sitting in his quarters reading over some files when suddenly he felt his room shake violently. He instinctively grabbed Lucy with one hand and the table, which was fixed to the floor, with his other. Several empty shotgun shells rattled off his desk onto the floor, two of his steampunk books flung themselves of his bookshelf, and a framed picture hit the floor and shattered. After another few seconds, the shaking subsided. Patton, after quickly picking up the frame and making sure the photo wasn't actually damaged, powered up his tacpad and called up Sinclair, who at this time of day would be in the security monitoring room.

"Sitrep!" He roared.

"Boss, oh my God-" Clair sounded breathless.

"Sinclair, was that some kind of earthquake we had just now?" Patton asked.

"No!" she said loudly. "Sorry, sir. Let me finish."

She paused. "Actually, you need to come up here and see this. Get everyone else too. Especially Ryan."

"Um, alright." Patton responded hesitantly. He wasn't used to being talked to like that, (it was usually _him_ telling people to move around) but then Sinclair actually seemed slightly scared, and considering how much it took to scare her, he guessed that what she wanted to show him must be pretty damn important. He radioed up everyone else and told them to meet him at security monitoring, then headed up there himself, slamming his helmet on as he did.

When he arrived, Sinclair almost shakily led him to a monitor of the Green's base entrance structure, which they had installed several days after finding the Greens. He took one look, used a cloth to make sure his visor was completely clean, looked again, and then said: "Damn!" He took a final look. "Is that what I think it is?"

Clair nodded. "It's a giant bomb, sir. Larger than I've ever seen."

"Shit." Patton swore. He suddenly understood why Clair wanted Ryan up here.

Ryan, Amber, Brian, Hearts, Hester, and Inez entered the room in one large crowd formation. Apparently _everyone_ wanted to know what was going on. Except for the new recruit, wherever the hell he was.

"Hey boss, where's the fi-" Ryan began.

Then he noticed the screen.

"Holy Sith that a giant fucking bomb!" He exclaimed, moving closer to the screen.

"Any idea what we're dealing with here?" Patton asked.

"Barely any." The explosives expert replied. "I've never even _heard_ about something like this. It's a nuke, I know that. It's throwing off rads left and right. But that's really all I can say."

"Yield?" Patton asked quietly.

"Can't say for sure. It depends on how much radioactive material is actually loaded in there, and what it actually is. But I'd guess a gigaton, _at least_. This thing goes of, it could easily take out the entire Halothrii Wilderness. Hell, the entire continent maybe!"

"So where the hell did this WMD come from?" Hester asked.

"It's like it just appeared all of a sudden," said Clair. "One second it wasn't, the next it was. And it looks heavy enough that when it appeared it caused that earthquake we felt just now."

Hester checked her assault rifle to make sure that it was loaded. "Well, I say we pay the Greens a visit and see what the hell they're up to," she stated. "And find out where the hell they got a bomb that big.

Patton nodded. "Damn right. Motor pool now, everyone. Saddle up. We're Oscar Mike ASAP."

* * *

Outside their base entrance structure, the Greens were still getting their bearings and recuperating from everything they'd been through when three more Greens approached them.

"Guys, look," called out Kenny. "Who's that coming out of our base?"

"I do not know," said Nome. "Replacements for us, most likely. Green Command would have believed us MIA, most likely KIA, after we left this universe."

Skope nodded. "Makes sense. Standard operating procedure."

"So," Jess asked. "How the heck do we explain to them about the bomb?"

"I can handle that," said Nome.

The three other Greens reached them. "Who the hell are you people?" one of them asked, raising his assault rifle.

"We are the former occupants of this base," Nome replied swiftly and efficiently. "And about the bomb, before you ask, permit me to explain-"

They were interrupted by the roar of vehicle engines. Two Warthogs and a Mongoose, being driven by the Yellows, swerved into the gap between them and the replacement team.

"Yes, you do have some explaining to do," Patton shouted out to the seven Greens, pulling his shotgun from under the seat. Taking a look at them, he sat up a bit straighter in the driver's seat. He recognized one of the Greens…and it wasn't one on the replacement team.

"Wait, medic? You're still alive? Wait, if you're here…"

He looked over the rest of the group. Sure enough, there was the rest of the original Greens.

"Okay, just what the hell is going on?" the same member of the replacement team shouted. "An earthquake, then we find that the largest bomb we've ever seen has appeared, and that you've come back from the dead, which means that all of you are zombies-"

"Zombies?" Kenny exclaimed. "What areyou talking about?"

"Everyone shut the fuck up, before I put a .30 cal round in your helmet!" Hester shouted, aiming her assault rifle. She pointed at Nome.

"You. Explain. _Now_."

Nome began hmmmmming, trying to think of the simplest and easiest way of explaining everything that had happened while they'd been in the other universe. Not to mention the fact that _everyone_ was staring at him, which did not help his nerves.

Jess put her visor in her gloves. "Ugh, this is so awkward!"


	23. TRUE COLORS

Slowly, Nome explained to the Yellows everything that had happened to the Greens while they had been away in the alternate universe, being sure to omit the part about their encounter with the Orange soldiers since he wanted to let the Yellows know only what he wanted them to. The story took him some time, and when he had finished the sky had turned completely dark, though the group was still illuminated the stars and the three moons overhead, and (to a lesser extent) the glowing smiling face on the front of Happy.

"It sounds like you've had one fuck of a day," Patton commented, shifting his grip on his shotgun. "Sucks to be you, I guess."

"So wait a minute," Ryan asked Nome as he forced himself up off the ground where'd he'd been laying during the medic's narration. "Are you saying that this bomb-"

He pointed at Happy. "-actually talks?"

Nome nodded. "That indeed appears to be the case, ridiculous and improbable as it sounds."

Ryan cautiously approached the bomb with all of the Yellows watching him. Upon standing directly in front of Happy's smiley face symbol, he shouted at it: "Hey, can you talk?"

Immediately the bomb's smiley face symbol lit up brighter than before and it shouted back: "Oh, HIIIIII! I'm Happy!"

Ryan jumped back with a cry. "Oh my God. Boss, I think it really does talk! It's a freaking talking WMD!"

"Sounds like something out of the Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy…" Hearts commented.

"Does it have a…name?" Clair asked.

"It always says that it is Happy," said Nome. "This is most likely because it is feeling happy and not a given name. However, we have not found anything more suitable to call it as of yet. And it certainly does not seem to mind."

"Yeah, I'd think you could tell if a bomb was unhappy pretty quickly," Ryan muttered, shying away from Happy's bulk.

"Excellent work, my fellow Greens," came a voice from off to the side, magnified artificially by a helmet's speaker system.

The Greens looked to find their replacement team, who had been watching them silently for some time now. It was only then that they realized they still had not introduced themselves. "You guys must be our replacement team, right?" Skope called over to them.

The three other Greens idled over to them. The one with large chest pads said: "That is true. So, what's it like being undead, then?"

"Excuse me?" Skope replied, taken aback.

"You're all zombies, yes?" The one with the chest pad asked. "The walking dead?"

Nome, Skope, Kenny, and Jess all looked at each other in confusion.

"What the flying fuck are you talking about?" Skope said back to the other Green. "We're not zombies! We're all still alive!"

"You mean, you never actually died like it says in the report? Not KIA?"

"No," Nome replied bluntly. Then he paused, and added; "How strange that Green Command would mark us KIA without any suitable proof. By my reckoning, they would have simply marked us as Missing in Action."

"They're not zombies!" the other Green shouted over to the other two members of the replacement team. Back to the original Greens he said: "Well then, allow me to introduce myself. I am the commanding officer of this base, Ferrero Rocher."

"No you are not," Nome said quite simply, a remark that caused everyone else to look at him.

"Beg your pardon?" Rocher asked, apparently surprised.

"I worked with a team that Rocher led back at Avalanche Base," Nome elaborated. "You are most certainly not him."

"I don't think we should tolerate this nonsense," another member of the Green replacement team shouted. "This is ridiculous! The commander is who he says he is!"

"And who would you supposedly be?" Nome asked.

"I am Frisbee Rezah," he replied.

"Then you are obviously not who you say you are either," Nome swiftly concluded

Rocher and Rezah crossed their arms simultaneously. "Oh, and how is that?" Rezah challenged.

"Firstly, because your armor looks completely different," said Nome. "Both Rocher and Rezah wear permanent silver colored visors. The silver visor color is a badge of honor, only awarded to those who have done incredible feats and gone above and beyond the call of duty. Rocher and Rezah both earned theirs when I was working with them."

Everyone looked as the medic spoke, and they could plainly see that Rocher's (or, perhaps, the person who was supposed to be Rocher) visor color was gold, while Rezah's visor color was the standard tan.

"Secondly," Nome continued, "Rocher never wore thick chest pads as you are wearing. He believed that they were too bulky for close movement. He preferred to out-think and out-move his opponents, rather than face them head on. He never required such heavy armor."

"Really?" Rocher said, sounding slightly surprised. He quickly changed tone and continued. "Well, I changed my mind."

"What is the middle initial of your, or should I say, Ferrero Rocher's name, then?" Nome asked him.

"Um…." Rocher paused. "C. It's C for Chocolate."

"Incorrect," said Nome. On his tacpad, he hit a few buttons, and a holographic list of names sprang up. Nome scrolled down quickly (as he could see Hearts staring intently at it, and guess (correctly) that the soldier was trying to read the information there) until he came upon the name he was looking for: Ferrero Ferrari Rocher. Everyone was now staring at Rocher. "You have not been truthful," Nome stated. "You are not Ferrero Rocher."

Everyone continued to stare at the not-Rocher and Rezah until they eventually broke down under the awkwardness of the moment, helped along by the rather loud arming noise that came from Lemon Squadron's weapons.

"We're Blues!" Rezah suddenly exclaimed, throwing up his hands in surrender. "Imposters!"

Rocher reached under his helmet briefly and took out what looked like some kind of box from the covering over his throat. When he spoke again, his voice was high as though he had been breathing helium.

In other words, unmistakably Blueish.

"The medic is right." He said. "We've been Blues this whole time. Under cover!"

Everyone looked at each other. Mr. Boom seemed particularly taken aback, shifting in position due to surprise.

"You know," said Ryan finally. "That actually explains kind of a lot. These guys are dumb as fuck, and now we know why." He chuckled, then tapped the side of his helmet, once again activating the combat cam in his helmet. "Second viral video here I come!"

"My real name is Jim-Bob," said non-Rocher. Pointing at non-Rezah he then explained: "And his real name is Flibobblermuffinhead, but I've always called him Muffin for short."

Patton nodded, a lot of random data finally falling into place for him. "Just like the prisoner suggested. These guys are dumb as Blues _'_ _cause_ _they_ _are_ _Blues_ , though he probably had no idea how right he was at the time." He glanced at Ryan, then asked over the secure squad channel "You're recording this, right?"

"You know it." The weapons specialist replied.

"You think I could get in here? I wanna send this to Bradley. He'll LOVE it."

"Can do, boss." Ryan adjusted his field of view to include his CO.

"What prisoner?" Skope asked the Yellows, having no knowledge of the conversation going on between Ryan and Patton.

"Someone we captured from them," Hester said, pointing at the non-Green replacement team. "That's all you need to know, and that's all you're going to know."

"You have Mr. Guy?" Jim-Bob exclaimed.

"His name is actually Kevin Guinness," Hearts called over to him. "Moron."

To Jim-Bob and Muffin, Jess inquired: "So if you're not Rocher and Rezah, then where are they?"

Jim-Bob explained: "At our base - a Blue base, that is- we ran into the real guys. The base's air defense shot down their Falcon, and we tried to capture them. They broke loose, and were killing all of us. But then, when they learned that we had information about the locations of all Blue bases in the Wilderness, they made a deal with us."

"A deal with Blues?" Patton asked, sounding shocked. "I find that very hard to believe somehow. And, yet..."

"Well, it wasn't like they gave us a choice or anything," Jim-Bob continued. "They went undercover as Blues to stake out our base, and in exchange they let the two of us live."

He pointed at Muffin, who nodded.

"We found their Green armor afterwards, and after a while we came up with the idea that we could pose as Greens. We even talked it over with the real Rocher and Rezah, and they didn't mind. They said that we could take their place while they were under cover in our base. Switch places, basically. Like what happened in some old book. It was the perfect plan."

"Except that according to Kevin you were both complete assholes," said Hester. "And I'm inclined to believe him."

"Yes, but that part was unavoidable," said Jim-Bob in a voice that was clearly some odd attempt at sounding sinister. "Because we saw him as the greatest threat to figuring out our true identities, so we had to treat him harshly to stop him from figuring it out."

"Okay, sure, that sounds completely logical," Amber noted sarcastically.

"From what he told us, you actually made it a hell of a lot more obvious," Patton countered.

"So...you just showed up as Rocher and Rezah? All by yourself?" Skope asked Jim-Bob. "Seems kinda implausible..."

Jim-Bob replied: "Well, after the Greens ousted us from the Base, we kinda wandered aimlessly in the Green's armor, trying it out, and we encountered this dark thing that told us to go to a Yellow base and spy on it for some reason."

The moment they mentioned "dark thing", the original Greens tensed.

"What dark thing?" Nome asked. "Could you be a little more specific?"

"Well, it was this big…black…shadowy thing," Jim-Bob said.

"Oh, yeah," agreed Muffin. "That describes it perfectly. Just this giant black…"

"Thing," Nome finished for them. They both nodded enthusiastically as he did so.

"It was big. And black. Really really black. Almost like formless ink," Muffin added unnecessary.

"Like a cloud." Jim-Bob continued. "Except...black. And not white and fluffy and happy."

"I wonder if it's the same entity we encountered in the hockey arena," Jess whispered to Nome over their own secure channel..

"I most certainly is," Nome whispered back. "We should speak of this later, when everyone is not staring at us. And when the Yellows and Blues are not here. This is a matter for us and us only."

"Something you wanna share with us, medic?" Patton called out to Nome, noticing the latter's helmet leaning in towards Jess's.

Nome was about to reply when another Yellow soldier arrived on a Mongoose.

"Sorry I'm late, boss," Wilson replied as he got off. "Had stuff to finish up in the warehouse. I couldn't just drop everythi-ohmyfuckinggod that bomb is HUGE!"

"Glad you could finally join us," Hester called out to Wilson with a slightly irked tone. "I hate FNGs," she then muttered under her breath.

"Hoh." Inez added coldly, stating Lemon Squadron's unofficial rally cry.

Wilson was still gawking at Happy, but Nome was staring at him. "Wait...that voice. Your armor. I know you; You're Private Anderson. How did you end up with the Yellows?"

Wilson swiveled his head towards Nome while the Yellows made utterances of "Who?" and "What?".

"Nome," Skope confronted. "What the hell are you talking about?"

"I''m not entirely sure." the medic replied. "All I know is that this man-" He pointed at Wilson. "-I saw several times at the northern Green base when I lived there. His name was Daniel Anderson."

"The base that got destroyed by the Reds right after you moved to live with us?" Skope asked.

Nome nodded. "Indeed, the very same. His armor color was different then, but his permutations were identical in every way. And I would never forget his voice."

All of the Yellows were staring at Wilson. The members of Patton's team seemed slightly confused, but Lemon (Patton included) were openly hostile. Hester went so far as to raise her rifle half-way, ready to snap it up and open fire at a moment's notice.

Wilson stared back at them. "Ah…I have no idea what he's talking about. Daniel Anderson? Never heard of him. Maybe our armor permutations were similar. I mean, they are kinda standard. But that's no reason to go making such accusations."

"GREEN standard." Inez said simply. That was all that she needed to say.

"The medic was right about the Blues," Patton thought out loud to himself. After some second he decided: "I think I might radio Bradley about this." He opened up his tacpad.

Wilson shook his head frantically. "No, no, that's not necessary."

"Command? This is Commander Alexander Patton. I need to speak to the Lord High Commander General," Patton said into his tacpad. "Authorization code: kilo-bravo-theta-alpha-whiskey 12."

"Code accepted," his tacpad replied to him with an automated voice. "Transferring. Please wait."

"Boss, don't do this," Wilson pleaded to Patton. Patton ignored him.

"Bro, that you?" a familiar voice came in from Patton's tacpad. The Commander had put it on speakerphone so his whole team (and Wilson) could hear.

"Bro!" Patton responded. "Look, I need to ask you something real quick."

"Sure thing, Bro. What is it?"

"Did you send my base a soldier today to take the role of mechanic?"

As Patton had his tacpad conversation with Bradley, Wilson slowly backed away from him, towards his Mongoose.

"Don't you already have a mechanic?" Bradley replied. "Didn't you say Captain Sinclair handled that?"

"Yeah. But there was this inspector guy who came by a day or so ago-"

"Wait; did you say inspector?"

"Yeah. Why?"

"Nothing. Go on."

"Right. Well, he said that no solider can take up more than one role at a base. So we were sent a soldier to take the role of mechanic. His name is Joshua Wilson."

Wilson mounted his Mongoose, slowly turned it around 180 degrees, and began slowly and quietly driving away back towards the Yellow's base, trying to keep his retreat as subtle as possible. Everyone but Patton was watching him, though Patton was so involved in his conversation with Bradley that he didn't notice at first. He wasn't really needed though; All of Lemon squadron had their eyes and weapons on his retreating form.

"Joshua Wilson, Joshua Wilson," Bradley mumbled to himself while searching the records. "Sorry Bro, but we don't have anyone enrolled in the Army with that name. At least, not in active service...says here there was a Joshua Wilson in Sector 15-B, but he's been dead for about two days. Accidentally fell off of a canyon cliff."

Patton nodded, reaching a sudden conclusion, and muttering under his breath: "Or was pushed off." Directly into his helmet's mike he said: "Thanks Bro. You've told me everything I need to know.?"

"Glad to be of help," said Bradley.

Patton shut off his tacpad, turned, and noticed that Wilson was streaking away from them at full speed on his Mongoose, a huge plume of dust flying into the air. "Hearts, if you don't mind?"

"Already on it, Pinkey," said Hearts, while aiming carefully through the scope of his sniper rifle. He fired. The round took out the rear left wheel of Wilson's Mongoose, causing it to flip out of control and perform a spectacular roll in the air which sent Wilson flying off of it and onto the ground with an impact that looked like it must have hurt.

"Inez, Patton, Mike Alpha Foxtrot! Nail him!" Hester shouted.

Both Patton and Inez nodded, and Patton kneeled down, holding his hands out in a cup shape. Inez took a couple steps back, then ran straight at him. At the end of her charge she leaped, and Patton caught her foot with his hands, launching her into the air.

The electronics expert twirled through the air, landing right next to a just-rising Wilson. She swung her robotic arm around and slammed it into his chest, raising a cloud of dust as she forced him to the ground.

"Clear!" She shouted.

By this time Patton and Hester had begun heading Wilson's way in both of their respective Warthogs. The Greens and Blues followed on foot, wanting to see exactly how this turned out. Within the next thirty seconds everyone had formed a circle around Wilson.

In a similar fashion as he had to Nome a few minutes earlier, Hester pointed at Wilson with her designated marksman rifle and stated: "Wilson, you've got some explaining to do. And do it fast, or I'll blow your fucking head off. Or, rather, I'll have PATTON blow your head off."

Wilson slowly stood up, still recuperating from his unintentional stunt on the Mongoose and the blow to his chest.

"Alright, alright. Don't hurt me. I guess there's no point in keeping it secret anymore anyway." he said to everyone. "I'm a spy for the Purple Army."

"There's a Purple Army?" Jim-Bob exclaimed. "Oh, wow! I had no idea."

"So the rumors are true..." Hester muttered. "Explain."

"We've sent out spies to scout several bases in this area," Wilson continued. "And Nome is right. I was sent to spy at his first base a week ago. But then the Reds demolished it, and I had to flee. So I was sent here next. You guys are both viable spying targets."

"Thanks." Hester said calmly. Then she swung the butt of her rifle into Wilson's helmet. "Secure him." She ordered.

Inez appeared behind Wilson and slapped a spec-ops grade neural jammer around his neck, paralyzing his armor and body so that he was unable to move.

"We'll take him from here," Hester informed the Greens and Blues as Inez hauled Wilson up with her robotic arm like he weighed nothing. "Don't want him giving all of you too much unnecessary information. Cause then we'd have to kill you, and I'd rather save THAT for a rainy day."

Wilson was loaded into the passenger seat of her Warthog, and with that the Yellows headed away back to their base.

Kenny turned to face Jim-Bob and Muffin. "I can't be believe Blues were able to establish a spy network in our base, even if it was just two people."

"Well, we had help from the black shadowy thing," Jim-Bob answered. "It altered the records for your Army so that we could take Rocher's and Rezah's places without anyone knowing."

"Yeah, the black shadowy thing has really cool special powers," Muffin put in. "It would have been awesome...if it weren't so creepy."

"I see…" said Nome, obviously disturbed.

"So what now?" Skope asked the Blues.

"We'll probably head off to Iota Base," said Jim-Bob. "Once we spray paint our armor so it's blue, we should fit right in!"

"Oh, wait, doesn't Iota have that guy who makes the meatball subs?" Muffin asked.

"Yeah, it does! Sandwich time!" Jim-Bob shouted back.

They high fived, then turned to head off towards the eastern canyon wall, but Nome called after them: "Before you go, could you tell me the reason that the shadow entity wanted you to spy on the Yellows?"

"It said something about _observing_ _the_ _failsafe_ , whatever that means," Muffin answered, shrugging. "Never really got to know more than that. Anyways, see you! We have sandwiches to eat!" The Blues waved goodbye to the Greens and set off.

Nome, Skope, Kenny, and Jess turned to face Mr. Boom. "I'm guessing that this guy's name is Mr. Boom," said Kenny, noting the nametag that said "Mr. Boom" on his armor.

Mr. Boom nodded.

"Don't talk much, huh?" Jess asked him.

Mr. Boom shook his head.

"Nome, have you seen this guy before?" Skope asked. "We need to make sure he's not _another_ spy for some other Army."

"I feel quite safe about him," said Nome. "The Blues Jim-Bob and Muffin mentioned only themselves in the plan to spy on the Yellows. Furthermore, he reacted with clear surprise when they revealed themselves to be Blues."

Mr. Boom nodded as Nome spoke.

"Right then, welcome to the team," said Skope to Mr. Boom, reaching out his hand. Mr. Boom took it and shook firmly.

"We should probably give him a proper introduction to Happy and Master Chief," said Jess, suddenly remembering the giant bomb and floating orb.

As she spoke, Master Chief popped up beside her from wherever it had been hiding during the confrontation with the Yellows. Mr. Boom looked at the orb for some seconds, then just nodded and waved at it. Master Chief nodded back, and with that the Greens and floating orb started trekking back towards their base entrance structure.


	24. A MATTER OF TRUST

Mr. Boom showed the Greens around their base, allowing them to see how their sleeping quarters had evolved while they'd been away. As there were now five people living in the base instead of just four, Mr. Boom decided to use one of the untaken rooms as his sleeping quarters, while giving Kenny back the room he had used before the Greens had gone MIA, something both were quite happy about, as Mr. Boom now had even MORE room to store his many weapons. Though it still took Mr. Boom nearly an hour to transfer all of his equipment, and this was made even longer because of the fact that Kenny was awed at how much weaponry there was in Boom's possession. The weapons specialist kept picking up Boom's things (often as he was in the process of moving them) and looking them over in wonder.

While Boom and Kenny were working things out, the other three Greens were investigating what had become of their rooms in their absence. Mostly, their reactions ranged from confusion to anger.

Nome had to meticulously clean his entire room, because according to him Jim-Bob had "severely compromised the carefully maintained sanitation" of the room, and he was forced to restore it. For the next ninety minutes, the medic was seen scrubbing every square centimeter of the room's surface with a large bottle of military grade disinfectant, a sterilized rag, and a maximum strength spray nozzle.

Meanwhile, Jess was faced with the horror of what Muffin had done to her room. Her magnificent TWILIGHT poster (the one she'd won in the costume contest at the last Interplanetary Pop-Culture Convention) had been replaced with a picture of Muffin, in his fake green colored armor, standing on the hood of a Warthog.

 _Self_ _obsessed_ _moron!_ She thought to herself as she tore it down violently. It took her some minutes to find the place where Muffin had put her poster, which was under the bed. She stuck it back up on the wall diligently. Thankfully, it seemed unharmed. Then an even more urgent thought occurred to her; the diary! It had been stuffed in her top desk drawer. She took the tome out and observed the lock on it. _Oh,_ _thank_ _God!_ _The_ _lock_ _hasn't_ _been_ _disturbed._ _The_ _Blue_ _was_ _never_ _able_ _to_ _open_ _it._ _What_ _a_ _relief_ _…_

Another person who was relieved was Skope, who found that his massive collection of _Star_ _Wars_ expanded universe novels, comics, and DVD's was mostly undisturbed. Whoever had inhabited his room while he'd been MIA clearly wasn't quite as much of a jerk as Jim-Bob and Muffin had revealed themselves to be, though he obviously disagreed about where in the chronology the second volume of Clone Wars went. Aside from some equipment that the other person had left behind, Skope didn't actually have a lot of work to do to get things back in order.

One final thing that needed to be taken care of was what to do about the giant bomb currently sitting on the front lawn of their base. Happy, of course, was much too large to bring inside, even with the help of Master Chief. It was, however, still quite dangerous.

So, in order to stop it from cheering itself up on its own, then exploding and taking the entire Wilderness with it, Nome came up with the idea of making a recording of "Spiked Kittens" and setting that to play next to the bomb, on a repeat cycle. It seemed to work, as Happy's rad levels receded to near nonexistent levels and remained there.

After about two hours had passed and everyone had become re-situated in the base, the five Greens met in the kitchen for a meal and to discuss plans for the immediate future. But first came the dinner problem;

"They've completely ransacked our food supply!" Kenny angrily reported as he tore through the kitchens cupboards and fridge, occasionally lobbing out an empty container of some form or another. "We're nearly out of pancake mix, Mac and Cheese, and fake juice drink! They even got into our fruit supply!"

"Do we have any apples left?" Skope asked. "I could really go for one right now."

Kenny looked through the fridges fruit drawer. "We have pear flavored apples, cherry flavored apples, and orange flavored apples. Oh, and I think there's one lemon flavored apple." He reported.

"What about apple flavored apples? The real ones?"

"Um, we're out. Sorry." Kenny dug some more, and pulled out the remains of an apple of some form. "Looks like those ass-holes ate them all."

"No apple flavored apples? Seriously?"

Kenny checked for the third time. "Yup. All gone. We're just left with the synth flavors."

Skope slammed his fist on the table, making the spoon that was on the other end of it launch onto the floor. "Damn, I hate GMO foods! You can never have normal flavored anything these days."

"It is indeed a tragedy that so many food products are genetically engineered," Nome agreed. "I attempt to avoid genetically modified foods whenever I can, but sometimes there is little choice in the matter."

"Especially when the military is concerned." Kenny grumbled from inside the cupboard.

Jess decided to move the conversation onto more important matters. "Okay. We need to decide what to do next. We learned a lot of stuff from our trek through that strange alternate universe. Or whatever the hell it was. So what now?"

"Report it in to Command. Definitely need to let them know about the Orange and Purple armies, since we now know for sure that they exist," said Skope. "And I'm not sure Command knows about the Reds yet, because when we tried talking to them about it they couldn't get over the fact that I was…"

"We get it," Jess finished for him. The ordeal of getting sniped in the butt and then having Command deride him for it had already annoyed Skope to the point that he was annoying everyone else with his annoyance, and there was no need to let Mr. Boom know about it unless necessary. Although considering that Boom appeared to be mute, he probably wouldn't do much with the information anyways.

"There are three armies that Command does not yet know about, in this case," said Nome. "We potentially have a six way war progressing at this point: us, the Yellows, the Blues, the Reds, the Oranges we encountered just before returning here, and now even the Purples. We must inform Command of the final three."

"I agree," Skope said. "Although when we radio them, I think someone else should to do the talking."

"I can speak to them," said Nome. "They will listen to me."

"Yeah, but we can't just tell them this stuff over the radio," said Jess, finally putting her knowledge of communications to use. "This kind of information can't be sent securely enough over COMs. It's too easy for another army to intercept the transmission."

"So we'll have to go there and tell them in person for them to know the whole story." Skope noted.

"A small detail, easily fixed." Nome said pleasantly.

"This could be fun. I've never been to Command," said Kenny. "I don't even know where the teleporter is to get us there."

"It is probably a lot closer then you are aware," Nome replied. "Every base contains one."

"Really?" Kenny exclaimed. "I had no idea. If it's been in here all this time, then why haven't I seen it before?"

"You'll find out soon enough," Skope replied. "Let's eat something, then radio Command to let them know we're coming, and then get Oscar Mike."

* * *

Kevin was awakened by the sound of a door opening. He looked up to see Inez and the new recruit again. Only this time, Inez was dragging the recruit behind her with her prosthetic arm, and the recruit looked completely limp. Kevin searched his mind to remember the recruit's name from the one time he had seen the recruit before, when he and Inez had checked in on him. Wilson, that's right. The guy's name was Wilson. That was what the torturer Inez had called him in the quick conversation he had overheard.

Inez took Wilson over to a cell and tossed him in like a ragdoll. He clattered along the floor before coming to a stop by the wall.

"Hey Green, you've got a new friend," Inez called over to Kevin, sadistic glee obvious in her voice. "Have fun."

Then she was gone with a horrifyingly emotionless laugh, and Kevin was left alone with Wilson.

"Hey, you're Wilson, right? Joshua Wilson." Kevin called over to Wilson. "Something happen?"

Wilson groaned. He attempted to shift a bit, but then remembered he couldn't because of the neural blocker around his neck. Then he grumbled: "What the hell do you think?"

Some more silence followed before Kevin figured out how to continue the conversation. "You want to talk about it?" He asked. It's not like we really have anything better to do right now." He shrugged his shoulders as much as he could.

"I'm a spy, alright?" Wilson responded. "And they found me out. Oh, and my name's not actually Joshua Wilson. That's just the alias I used for this base. I real name's…" He stopped. "Never mind. It doesn't matter now. And in any case, they might be listening in."

"C'mon, what is your real name?" Kevin asked. He was honestly curious. And, if worse came to worse, he could use that information to bargain with the Yellows.

The spy didn't respond, except to cough and shift a little, trying to right himself.

"Can you at least tell me who you're a spy for?"

The spy gave a strong a nod as he could manage with all non-essential bodily functions below his neck blocked. "The Purple Army."

Kevin shook his head and moved in a little closer towards the transparent wall between him and the spy. "Um, did you just say the _Purples_?"

"Do you have a hearing problem?" the spy snapped back. "Yes, I'm from the Purple Army."

"Oh." Kevin said simply. "But didn't the Purple Army get destroyed, like, three years ago?" Kevin asked. "I remember something about an uprising on Roster Teth…"

"Yes, we were. We began _again_ a few months ago. We've been keeping it low key ever since we assembled enough forces to begin again."

"Makes sense, I guess." Kevin agreed. "Must have been a pain to reconstruct your army." He added conversationally.

The spy chuckled. "Wasn't all that hard, really. Not all of us were wiped out when the Greens, your army, attacked Roster Teth. Some of us, a couple dozen, survived, and were just biding our time until recently."

"And what happened recently?"

"We were able to convince the surviving citizens of Roster Teth to join us," the spy explained. "Much of that planet was just…wrecked…from the Green's attack. The small numbers of people who still lived there were angry. And we used that anger."

Kevin nodded. "A month ago, I had heard reports that we had evacuated from Roster Teth, but I never got around to looking into what that was about."

The spy nodded. "It was a full scale revolution. The end of the Green occupation of Roster Teth. And the second start of _my_ army."

"I see…" was all Kevin could come up with as a reply. Then he decided to ask: "If you have your forces back, then why haven't you decided to attack anyone yet? What's with all this spying business?"

The spy let out a small laugh. "Oh, we have done attacking. Just not on armies you are very familiar with. You already know about the Reds. They've inexplicably come into existence, with massive numbers of forces, in just the last few days. They, we, and a third army have been fighting our own private war on the other side of the planet. It's a test of wills, I suppose, to see which of us can become strong enough to take on the three big guys. Your army, the Yellows, and the Blues, that is."

"You've been fighting a whole other war outside of our knowledge?" Kevin asked, the surprise showing in the tone of his voice.

The spy nodded. "Yup. While the three big guys have been fighting over this continent for its resources, we've been duking it out ourselves on the opposite hemisphere. The reason the Reds haven't attacked this base yet is because they've been attacking _my_ army."

"And you said there was a third army in your private war. Who are they?"

The spy again chuckled. "Since our secrecy is quickly becoming a thing of the past, I trust that you will discover that soon enough. And in any case, I've told you about all I can without knowing for sure if the Yellows are listening in on us or not."

"Well, what you did tell me certainly wasn't a little."

"Ah, I suppose I could tell you one more thing," corrected the spy. "Though it hardly concerns me. But you might like to hear it."

"And what's that?"

"Your former COs at the base you came from? Rocher and Rezah. They were Blue spies."

Kevin shot up. "Blues? You're shitting me. I was right!" After a moment, he added "That actually explains a lot."

"But I'm not done," said the spy. "The Greens who originally occupied the base, that you were sent to replace? They're back now."

"Really? They aren't dead? Cool! Are they…competent?"

The spy gave a hard managed nod. "From what I could tell…yes. A hell of a lot more competent then the Blues pretending to be your teammates, if that's what you're asking."

"I have to get back there," said Kevin determinedly, after a moment of thought. "I need to get on the team I'm supposed to be. I allowed myself to be captured by the Yellows because I thought that my team was composed of idiots, when really it was all a rouse. Well, that, and that Patton guy DID threaten to blow my head off. Now I actually have a purpose. I must get out of here."

"Easier said than done," the spy remarked. "But if we work together…then I think we might be able to manage it. I help you get out, you help me get out."

"Can I trust you?" Kevin asked.

"Do you honestly think you have a choice?" the spy countered. "And yes, you can. I've got no reason to betray you. And, from my spywork, I think I know enough about this place to get us out of here. We just need to be patient. When they interrogate me is probably when I'll be able to make the first step towards our escape."

"You sure they'll interrogate you-" Kevin started, then thought back to how sadistically happy Inez had been with the idea of a new prisoner. "Never mind."

"I'm positive of it." The spy said quietly. "These ARE Yellows, after all. And they've got a spec ops team with them too. They'll be having a chat with me pretty soon."

Kevin nodded. "Hey, since we're working together now, what should I call you? As a matter of trust, I should know your real name."

The spy thought for a moment. "Since you're from the Green Army…how about you call me Daniel Anderson. As a matter of trust."


	25. SINCLAIR'S PLAN

Wilson heard the slamming of the door to the cell room and looked up to see that the Yellow soldier who had punched him earlier, Inez, had returned. She hit the control panel to open his cell, and then picked the Purple spy up with her robotic arm, much like a ragdoll. This effect was increased by the lack of movement in Wilson's body due to the neural blocker.

"C'mon, spy. It's playtime."

"Uh…playtime?" Wilson wondered.

"Playtime," confirmed Inez calmly. "We've set up a sparkly little room just for you."

She carried Wilson through the halls, going even deeper into the bowels of Yellow Base. Wilson realized that he had never heard Inez speak much before, let alone speak happily, and somehow this lightly terrified him. After about three minutes Inez took him into a small room and tied him to a chair there. However, this was clearly no ordinary room. Every square centimeter of the wall in the room was covered with shining energy shields, transparent surfaces with little mass that could reflect or absorb any object trying to pass through them.

Wilson looked around in confusion; this was unlike any interrogation method he had been through so far. He had no idea what the energy shields were for. Normally, they were used as defensive structures.

Inez gave a slight throaty chuckle, the first semblance of a laugh Wilson had heard her utter, though it sounded more like a dry cough than anything else. Then the Yellow said to him: "Have fun."

 _Interrogations_ _must_ _be_ _what_ _this_ _Yellow_ _is_ _really i_ _nto,_ Wilson thought to himself. _The_ _ONLY_ _thing_ _I_ _'_ _ve_ _ever_ _seen_ _her_ _into._ _Something tells me I should be afraid._ _Very afraid._

Inez left the room, the door sealing behind her and making an electronic buzzing as its shield surface fell back into place, flush with the rest of that wall.

As Wilson continued to stare around at the room in wonder, the Yellows were watching him from behind a shield that also acted as a two-way mirror. Patton, Hester, and Clair stood next to Inez and Ryan, all observing the Purple.

"Sir, with your permission, I'd like to conduct this interrogation," Clair stated to Patton.

"Duly noted." said Patton. "But I have far more experience with interrogations, and this spy has far too much important information."

"You do have experience, don't we all know it," Hester agreed.

Inez made another dry coughing noise in agreement.

"But the shield walls were my idea," Clair protested. "And in any case, you don't even know yet what I have in mind for them."

"I thought they were just some weird decoration to psyche him out or something," said Ryan. "I mean, I'm standing out here, and I'm starting to feel a little weirded out."

"Listen boss," Clair said to Patton. "No offense to your skill, but I know Wilson better than anyone else here. I may not have worked with him long -hell, not even a day- but even so I know I can get into his head better than any of you can."

"True," said Hester. "Thing is, none of us know him that well at all. He's not even told us his real name."

"I'm wasn't done," said Clair, voice surprisingly cold for someone addressing a superior. "Secondly, when he revealed himself to be a spy, he betrayed all of the trust I had in him. Ever since I've been stationed at this base, I've had so much stuff to do with little if any help to do it. And then Wilson came along. I thought I might actually be able to put my trust in someone better then a former Blue who tries to microwave his magnum every other night! He was going to be…like…my partner. And then he destroyed all of that."

Patton noticed that she had started gripping the hallway railing so tightly that its metal was becoming slightly warped.

"And also there's the fact that I have shield walls set up in that room for one very specific plan, a plan that will shake him to his core and that WILL get him to talk. I have some psychological treatment training, after all. That is why I must be the one to do this."

"So, you want revenge?" Hester asked quietly, cutting Ryan off. Clair jerked in her armor.

"I...guess." She admitted. Hester laughed, just once.

"Should have said that before, Captain," She added, before nodding to Patton.

Ryan gave a nervous laugh and called out: "Did she just morph into, like, an evil overlord or something-"

"Do it." Patton interrupted, talking to Clair. "You probably need some interrogating experience anyways."

Clair nodded. "Thanks, boss." She then turned to Ryan. "I need your plasma launcher."

"What?" Ryan asked quickly.

"Your Plasma Launcher. One of the weapons you borrowed from Command, the shoulder mounted cannon that fires plasma grenades."

"Go get it, Hobar," Patton ordered. "Double time."

"Yes sir," Ryan said as he turned and made for his quarters at a good clip.

"Shield walls and a Plasma Launcher," Hester thought out loud to herself. "What could she-" The pieces fit into place in her mind, and she chuckled. "Now _that_ _'_ _s_ clever!"

"What?" Patton asked.

"You'll see," Hester responded. "It's probably best if I don't spoil it for you. You'll like this, trust me."

"Then I think I'll just wait then." Patton replied.

Ryan returned about five minutes later carrying the plasma launcher. "Here she is," he called out, indicating the weapon by shaking it over his head.

"Good," said Clair. "Now set the launcher for a lower charge. Whatever setting is the highest that won't kill. We want him to talk, not to die…yet."

"Interrogation setting," said Ryan happily. "I recently installed it into all of the weapons I took from Command. Ever since I saw what Patton did to that Red with the hammer…I guess you could say I felt inspired." He shrugged.

"Glad I could be of help," said Patton.

Clair examined the Launcher, then nodded at Ryan. "That's perfect."

Ryan took a moment to adjust the Plasma Launcher to its interrogation setting, and then he handed it carefully over to Clair. "I do want this back, so try not to damage it. Oh, and try not to blow yourself up too."

"I won't," Clair assured him. She then hoisted the Launcher on her shoulder and stepped into the interrogation room.

"See, Patton?" Hester told the Yellow CO. "This is going to be _very_ fun."

"I can already tell." Patton replied gleefully.

Clair closed the door behind her and approached Wilson, making sure to keep the Plasma Launcher perfectly visible to him.

"Wilson. Or rather, that's your alias for this base, isn't it?"

Wilson looked up at her as best he could. "Oh, hi."

Clair continued: "We overheard you telling the Green prisoner about your private war with two other armies," she explained to the spy. "Thing is, if you're here, that means a Purple base must be near here as well. You're going to tell us its location."

"No," Wilson stated firmly. "If you've already overheard my conversation with the Green then you've already heard enough. I ain't talking."

Clair raised the Plasma Launcher to her shoulder.

"Oh, what's that?" She asked, feigning surprise. No more clever excuses for knowing far more then you should? No more fun conversation?"

"Since you know who I am, our...semblance of a work relationship is over. I ain't talking."

"Like Hell you won't!" Clair began to power up the Plasma Launcher.

Wilson stared up at her in amusement. "Yellow, I think we both know you won't fire that off in here. It would become just as much of a danger to you as it would to me. And furthermore, since this is an interrogation, you need me alive anyways. Do you really think I'm so stupid as to believe that you would risk my death before I've told you everything I know?"

"You betrayed me," Clair said through gritted teeth. "You betrayed all of us. I'll risk anything if it will torment you." The Launcher was now nearly fully charged. "Anything."

"Clair, spare me. You would have to be completely insane-"

Clair pulled the trigger on the Launcher. The gun released a Plasma Grenade, which immediately began bouncing all over the room, being reflected by the shield walls.

"-Are you FUCKING INSANE?" Wilson finished as his sentence changed to a much more panicked nature. He's lowered his head when the grenade started bouncing, and now he raised it again.

Clair began charging the Launcher up for a second firing. Wilson screamed: " _You_ _'_ _ll_ _kill_ _us_ _both._ _Are_ _you_ _completely_ _out_ _of_ _your_ mind? _!_ "

In response, Clair released the second grenade.

Wilson's screams were now reminiscent of the cries the Red soldier Steve had uttered when Patton was interrogating him at Blue Base Iota; in other words, he sounded like a terrified little girl. Not that he was in any real danger, of course. With its interrogation setting on, the Launcher's grenades would only sting, though of course Wilson did not know this. As the two Plasma Grenades ping-ponged around the room Wilson continued to scream like bloody murder until finally he shouted: "Fine, I'll fucking talk!"

Clair hit the discharge button on the Launcher, and both grenades evaporated into whiffs of gas.

"Alright then, now we're getting somewhere. The coordinates for your Purple Base?"

Wilson hastily uploaded the coordinates to Clair's heads-up display. "It's about nine clicks from here, and just underground in a miniature cave system."

"And there's something else we need to know."

"Oh fuck, what is it now?"

"In your private war, you're against the Reds and who else? Who is the sixth army?"

"The Orange Army," Wilson explained, after a short pause and a glance at the launcher still on Clair's shoulder. "And before you ask, yes, they were wiped out. They've also been reborn recently. About the same time as my army, actually. Like us, they were probably waiting in secret. Waiting until the right moment came, a moment of discord for the other armies that they could take advantage of."

"The revolt at Roster Teth," Clair finished for him.

"Most likely," said the spy. "Their origins are shady, even to us. At this point, your guess is as good as mine."

"What planet did they reclaim first?"

"We don't actually know. We just know that in recent months they've been coordinating at a secret location, or locations. Honestly, their rise to power is almost as mysterious as that of the Reds, only they came back over several weeks, not days."

Clair nodded. "I see. You wouldn't happen to know where any of their bases are, would you?"

"No. Sorry."

Clair raised the Plasma Launcher.

"You sure?" She asked calmly.

"I'M SURE!" Wilson stammered. "DEAD SURE!"

Clair decided his response was fearful enough to be believable. "Okay then, I just need one more piece of information."

"Oh man, not another one...fine, what now?"

"You're real name."

Wilson hesitated. Clair again threatened with the Launcher.

"It's…Zalias. James Zalias." Wilson said quickly.

Clair put her face right in front of the spy's. "Alright then, Mr. Zalias. When we get to the Purple Base, we'll be sure to look up the roster for personnel. And if you're name isn't in it, then-" She pointed at the Launcher.

"Oh, son of a BITCH," the spy spat. "Fine. My real name's Travis Chamealon."

"Are you absolutely sure?"

The spy, Travis, nodded. "Yes, I'm sure. It's not an alias this time. That's my real name. It'll be on the base roster."

"Good," said Clair, lowering the launcher. "I think we're done here…for now."

She exited the room to find that every other member of the base had been watching from out in the hallway, through the two-way mirror.

"That was awesome!" shouted Ryan, pumping his fist. "I had no idea you had such a dark side in you."

"Good work, Sinclair," Patton congratulated her, patting her shoulder. "I might have you do more interrogations."

"Thanks boss," Clair responded. "He gave me the coordinates for the Purple base in the Wilderness."

"Yes, I heard," said Hester. "It's almost completely dark outside now, though. I think we should head out tomorrow at first light."

"Sounds like a good plan," Hearts agreed. "I hate having to snipe in the dark. IR goggles can get pretty annoying to use sometimes."

"The Purple's guards will be tired. We can hit them when they are weak." Inez added in, the longest sentence any of the group had heard her say.

"Well, let's all get some R&R then," Patton said. "'Cause tomorrow's gonna be a big day."

* * *

The Purple spy Travis Chamealon was yet again tossed like a wet filthy dishrag into his cell by Inez's robotic arm. The sound of him crunching against the side of the back wall was intense enough to awaken Kevin from the rough sleep he had managed to enter.

"Sweet dreams, Travis Chamealon," Inez murmured condescendingly at the spy. The she left the way she had come, to door to the detention block slamming behind her. For the umpteenth time that day, Travis groaned. His neural jammer had been purposefully nullified slightly just before the interrogation (so that none of his limbs went dead from remaining in the same position), allowing him a bit of motor function, but only weak movements at best.

Kevin crawled over to the transparent wall separating the two of them. "Travis Chamealon?"

Travis nodded. "Yeah. My real name. They forced it out of me."

"Huh. I figured Daniel Anderson was just another alias of yours. A matter of trust doesn't 'matter' much with a spy, I guess."

"Well, is it like I had a choice?" Travis countered. "The Yellows were almost certainly listening in on us at the time. I couldn't reveal it unless I had no other choice! So of course I gave you an alias."

"Yeah, I get it," Kevin responded. "And don't worry, it's okay."

Travis continued: "Yup, that alias is one of many." After apparently thinking to himself for a moment, he then changed his tone to one far more urgent: "We have to get out of this place. ASAP."

"Tell me something I don't know." Kevin commented. "But what's the rush? Aside from the obvious reason."

"These people are fucking insane!" Travis stammered. "They put me in a room covered with shield walls and then used something to launch a plasma grenade and had it bounce all over the place! They'll kill us both if we don't do something!"

Kevin shook his head in surprise. "Fuck. This is bad. I mean, I know Yellows were brutal, but that..." He sighed. "So what do we do then? I hope you've got a plan, 'cause I sure as hell don't."

Travis let out an angry grunt. "This is all so stupid. I can't believe I didn't last even a single day before being found out!"

"Yeah, what's up with that, anyways?" Kevin asked. "You're like the worst spy in the history of spying."

"This is only my second spy job," said Travis. "Before I came to this planet, I was a rebel on Roster Teth, one of the people who caused the overthrow of the Green occupation. I had learned to fight, to kill. But then Roster Teth was taken, and in order to avoid attracting too much attention from the Blues or Yellows we had to keep a low profile. Thus began the Spy Agency, of which I am a member."

"Your first spy job was in a Green base, wasn't it?" Kevin stated.

"Yes," Travis confirmed. "Avalanche Base. But it was SO different from here. Here, they have all these protocols and things about where you can go. In Avalanche, it was just a bunch of scientists who didn't really care what I did with myself. They have a code where everyone's ideas are taken into account, and that means everyone has access to everywhere. Well, almost everywhere…but certainly it's less restricted then in this place! When I got here, I thought that just like in Avalanche I could explore up and down the place, and no one would give a fuck. But GOD was I wrong!"

Kevin gave his best attempt at a nod. "Yup, that explains quite a lot."

"I'm a terrible spy," Travis admitted. "And I shouldn't be here. Which is why we need to get out."

"I know," said Kevin. "But the question is, how? We're sealed up in this cell block tighter then a gold ingot."

Travis nodded. But before he said anything else he pointed to a camera up on the corner of the room, one which Kevin had somehow not been able to notice. Then he reached groggily up to his helmet and hit a few buttons on it. After reaching what he deemed an appropriate setting, he opened up his tacpad (which he could now barely reach, thanks to his loosened neural jammer) and typed in something.

A message appeared on Kevin's heads-up display: NOW THAT THEY GAVE ME MOTOR FUNCTION, I CAN FINALLY USE THIS WAY TO COMMUNICATE. DON'T WORRY, THIS MESSAGE IS BEING SENT TO YOU ON A FREQUENCY THEY CAN'T POSSILBLY KNOW ABOUT.

Kevin opened up his suit's non-verbal communication system, a standard install that most soldiers didn't use, and replied: GOOD PLAN. SO, HOW DO WE GET THE HELL OUT OF HERE?

WITH THIS. After making sure he was out of view of the camera, Travis pulled out a keycard. I MAY HAVE HAD VERY LIMITED MOTOR FUNCTION, BUT IT DOESN'T TAKE MUCH. I MANAGED TO GET THIS OFF OF SINCLAIR WHEN SHE WAS PREOCCUPIED WITH THE GRENADE LAUNCHING DEVICE.

Kevin shook his head and typed in: THAT'S SOMETHING, BUT HOW ARE WE GOING TO USE IT? WE CAN'T EVEN REACH THE CONTROL PANEL FROM HERE.

Travis typed in: NEVER SAY NEVER. THERE'S ALWAYS A WAY. I'VE HAD TO DO MUCH TOUGHER ESCAPES THEN THIS.

Kevin's only response was: ELABORATE. WE STILL NEED TO REACH THE CONTROL PANEL.

Travis pulled out another device, which looked like a thin metal rod that was curved at the end. He then eyed the many little air holes in the front wall of his cell, which were certainly large enough for the rod to fit through. LEAVE THAT TO ME.


	26. CENTERPOINT CITY

The sun had not yet gotten over the western mountain when it came time for the members of Green Base to awaken. At 0800 hours precisely, everyone gathered in the radio room to prepare to go to Command. Nome was put to the task of radioing Green Command, since no one knew if the personnel at Command were yet over hearing how Skope had been sniped in the ass, and if they weren't then Skope would only be derided again if he was the one calling them up. A possibility the sniper was very vocal about avoiding.

The medic dialed in the correct number into the transceiver and was greeted with a slightly updated version of the voice recorded greeting from the late 20th and early 21st centuries.

"Hello, and welcome to the Green Command Hotline," a stylish voice poured out of the radio's speakers. Nome, always considerate, had set the radio to full broadcast so the whole group could hear. "This channel is for Green Army personnel only, so if you are from any other Army then please get off immediately. Also, I am a voice recording, so please refrain from responding until you have been connected with someone who is _not_ a voice recording. Assuming you really are from the Green Army and not an enemy who has somehow managed to tune into this frequency, I thank you for using this hotline. You will now be connected with someone who is a real person."

After five more minutes of waiting through easy-listening fiesta muzak, someone on Command's end of the line finally picked up. Judging by the tone of his voice, he'd probably had several cups of coffee or an adrenaline injection. "Hello, this is Green Command. How may I assist you?"

Nome responded: "Greetings, fellow Green. This is the base in the south of Sector 18-Alpha. We have gathered valuable information that concerns the entire war and must come to Command to tell the Grand General about it immediately."

The person on the other end countered: "Whoa, slow down there, dude. First of all, 'fellow Green'? I'm not Marvin the Martian, bro. And second of all, the Grand General is the leader of our Army. Y'know, 'cause he's the Grand _Fucking_ General? He doesn't speak to just _anyone_. You gotta, like, make an appointment or something. Cause he's busy leading us. And stuff."

"I understand, but we have information that greatly impacts the war at large," Nome stated. "It is imperative that we speak to him as soon as possible."

"About what?"

Nome paused, checking to see if the signal was secure. It was, and encrypted with Jess's personalized scrambler.

"Firstly, that at least three armies that were believed dead have returned. Secondly, that we have been to another universe and have recently returned from it. And thirdly, that we have in our possession a giant bomb that is capable of destroying at least all of the Halothrii Wilderness, if not much more. Is that enough reason for him to speak to us?"

"Uh, let me check. You got a name?"

"Yes. Medic First Class Nome Achentau-"

"Never mind, the computer just spat it out. Hold on a sec."

There was a long silence on the other end. Over the link, the sounds of hurried conversation and running feet could be heard. Eventually the words "Please hold" came through. This was followed by about seven minutes more of music, this time polka, which Kenny started to dance too until Skope smacked him upside the head.. At that point the person on the other end picked up again.

"Hey dues, I just spoke to the Grand General," he informed the Greens, sounding no less excited. "The Grand _Fucking_ General! For real! Now, _I_ don't know what the flying fuck you're talking about, or who you are, but apparently _he_ does, because he _really_ wants to see you guys. Hang on while I fire up the teleporter link so you can come on over. Have a safe trip. Over and out."

Nome pressed the button to shutdown the transceiver. "I believe that conversation went well, all things considered.

"So then, where exactly is our base's teleporter?" Kenny asked. "I didn't even know we had one."

"I believe Jess can be of assistance here." He nodded to the communications expert, who returned it. She tapped a few keys at a console, and a hidden wall compartment slid down to reveal a teleporter node, which activated seconds later.

"Here," Jess said as she pointed to the node. "We keep it secret for in case the base is taken. Can't have the enemy gaining access to Centerpoint City."

"Centerpoint City?" Kenny asked, mystified.

"It's the city where our central command is," said Skope. "That's why it's called Centerpoint City, because it's the center of all our operations. That, or someone read the Corellian Trilogy."

"It's located just outside the Wilderness, and is probably the last remaining true city on the planet, since nearly all others were wiped out during the war." Jess added in, quickly interrupting Skope's intended Star Wars rant. "None of the other armies have any idea of its existence, and that's the way we have to keep it secret."

"I see," said Kenny. "That makes sense."

Nome motioned to the teleporter. "Well, shall we?"

Skope did one final check outside to make sure that the audio recording for "Spiked Kittens" was still playing to keep Happy under control, then followed the others as they stepped through the activated teleporter. Master Chief shot past him just before he went through himself. Apparently the floating orb wanted to see Centerpoint City as well. That, or he didn't particularly like the idea of being stuck in the base with Happy outside.

There was a brilliant flash, and the Greens found themselves in a hilly area covered with trees, which looked to be in the trough of a shallow ravine. A river ran down the approximate center of the ravine, curving and twisting in a natural way, and everyone fell in step behind Nome as he followed it.

"Uh, guys, are we in the right place?" Kenny asked, looking around.

"Yup," said Skope. He wondered if the weapons specialist could possibly make any more obvious the fact that he was the only one of the four of them who hadn't been to Centerpoint City yet.

"This is Centerpoint City?" Kenny asked as they walked. "Are you sure? This doesn't look like a city."

Nome shook his head. "We are in the right place, but this is not the city." Before the medic said anything else, they came to an awesome sight which explained everything.

The ground dropped away to reveal a sea, and in the distance was a grand spectacle. A durasteel city rose from the water on a great cylindrical pedestal supported by huge rods that stuck out into the hills surrounding it. Massive towers carried the top of the city even higher. If there ever were buildings that deserved the title of "skyscraper", they would be them. Height included, the city looked as though it might be larger than the Wilderness itself. A fitting location for the center of operations for the Green Army, certainly, for they could see dozens of monorail cars carry personnel back on forth from the city over the water via the metal supports.

" _That_ is Centerpoint City," said Nome.

Kenny was still gawking at the sight.

"We have all teleporters take us just outside the city," Jess explained. "That way, if any enemy _does_ gain access to the teleporters, the city can still be defended because we can secure a perimeter. The only way in and out are those monorails and by air."

Skope opened up his tacpad and hit a key. In the distance, a monorail car began making its way towards them from the city. "I always enjoy the rides to and from the city," he told the others. "The sights can't be beat."

Kenny was still gawking at the city. Master Chief was staring at it as well, though the orb seemed surprised for some reason, because it kept looking back and forth between the forest and the city.

The monorail soon arrived at a terminal near the Greens. Kenny was forced to stop gawking (via a yank by Skope) so that he could get on the car with the other Greens and Master Chief.

"I can't wait to see this place," he exclaimed. "If it looks as good on the inside as it does on the outside then this is gonna be awesome!"

The monorail's doors closed, and the car began its journey back towards the city. As it pulled away from the ravine, the Greens could see that, indeed, the teleporters to the city actually surrounded it, because monorails were coming in from all compass directions. Jess had been correct that the teleporters were a "perimeter" around Centerpoint.

Then the monorail took them inside the city, and Kenny became slightly disappointed. Most of the structures in the city looked like office buildings, though impressively tall. Understandable, considering the amount of logistical work required to run an army as big as the Greens. But as they neared the center of the city it became apparent that something had gone wrong. Smoke and fire billowed from some places, and certain buildings had been partially destroyed. Centerpoint looked as though it had just been subject to an attack, but not from outside. Judging by the damage density, it looked like the attack had come from within the city's perimeter and expanded outward.

"What the heck happened?" Skope asked, voicing everyone else's thoughts. "Why does the center of the city look like it got blown up?"

"I hope this isn't what the Grand General wants to speak to us so adamantly about," Jess said nervously.

However, the monorail was taking them to the direct center of the city, where the destruction looked to be most concentrated. They were now near a couple of damaged buildings in what looked to be a construction yard. Bare soil made up the ground off of the road, and a crane was in the middle of putting some road sections on a ramp that had been destroyed. The repairs here had a long way to go, however, for a flaming Falcon was embedded in one of the buildings several stories from the ground and pieces of fallen stanchion were everywhere. Also, at some point a large transport ship had obviously taken fire over the site; a still-sputtering jet engine lay on the repair walkway just below the crashed Falcon. It was undoubtedly the most wrecked place in the whole city, yet apparently it was also where the Grand General was waiting for the Greens, as this was where the monorail lowered to the ground and opened its doors.

The Greens cautiously stepped out and into the road. On the road's northern side a pair of soldiers stood waiting, who walked over to them as soon as they exited the monorail car. "Are you the members of the Base in Sector 18-Alpha?" one of them asked.

Nome nodded. "Yes, that is correct."

"Good," the second soldier said. "The Grand General is waiting for you. Follow us."

The soldiers led the Greens into the structure nearest them, a twenty meter high building that looked in the best condition of all other buildings in the area. Metal posts lined the doors, installed recently by the looks of them, and a well lit lobby room with a large stairway that spanned most of the width of the entryway. A short climb later, and they had found the Grand General.

The Grand General was staring out through a doorway at the rest of the ruined buildings in the area. He turned when he heard the Greens approach, and the Greens were able to see his full armor.

Kenny would later refer to the Grand General's outfit as "kind of like a puffer fish". To say that he had large chest plates was an understatement. To say that he had a big helmet was also an understatement. His armor took up so much volume, in fact, that it could easily be described as a rather large, though admittedly badass and lethal looking, fat suit. The Grand General approached the Greens, who all snapped salutes.

"You must be the ones who've been to the other universe," he said to them.

The Greens looked back and forth among themselves, wondering how in the hell he could possibly know that.

"But forgive me, I've forgotten to introduce myself," the Grand General digressed. "I am Grand General Richard Face, Commander and Chief of the Green Army."

"We all know who you are, sir," replied Skope with as much honor as he could stuff into his tone. "Richard Face, also known as the 'Face' of the Green Army. It is an honor to meet you in person, sir." He reached out to shake the Grand General's hand, and he returned it.

"Wait, Richard Face?" Kenny interrupted. "If you substitute 'Dick', the short name for Richard, as the first name, then-"

"You should stop right there," the Grand General interrupted forcefully, turning to face Kenny. "I recently demoted my second in command to Junior Class Private for making that same distinction."

"Um, never mind then!" Kenny exclaimed. "I said…nothing. Absolutely nothing!"

"I thought so," said the Grand General. He then changed the tone of the conversation to a more urgent subject, and addressed all of the Greens. "Now then, I've heard that you've been to another universe. Is this correct?"

"It is indeed," said Nome. "But if I may ask, how do you know this, sir? We have not yet spoken of this at all, aside from what I told the operator when I requested our meeting. But you seem like you know more than just that."

"I do know much more. We have been aware of this other reality for some time," the Grand General replied. "In labs we've been able to capture brief split second glimpses of it. However, we've never been able to actually travel there…until you, apparently. How did you do it?"

Nome briefed the Grand General in detail about everything that had happened over the course of the last five days. When he mentioned the room in Red Base where they'd fought Steve and fallen into the abyss, the Grand General nodded, mentioning that he'd seen labs in the city set up in a similar fashion for the Green Army's own extrauniversal experiments.

Elaborating a little further than that, the Grand General said: "The Reds must have technology far better than ours, if they're actually able to open a stable portal to the other universe. We haven't been able to do that yet, and we need to know how they are. We need that tech for ourselves."

Nome continued telling the Grand General what had happened in the other universe, particularly about their discovery in the center of the Abyss of Absentmindedness that the Reds might once have been a tribe who lived there. But he also told of every other event as well, such as the tower with fusion coils and a speaker at the top, their encounter with Master Chief, and the circumstances under which they met Happy the Giant Bomb. The Grand General nodded with every sentence, taking everything in.

"So the bomb is back at your base," said the Grand General after Nome had finally finished. "Probably a good choice, if it's as powerful as you say. But where is this orb entity you call Master Chief?"

On cue, Master Chief floated down from the ceiling, where it had been watching the conversation from, in between gazing out at the city. It dropped right in front of the Grand General's face. In the blink of an eye ten assault rifles were pointing at it. The Greens jumped out of surprise at the ten soldiers who had seemingly appeared out of nowhere. The Grand General waved a hand at them, and they lowered their weapons went back into their places of hiding. "That was my Elite Guard," he explained. "I apologize. Any unexpected encounters must be taken care of, as standard procedure." He motioned to the orb. "And this must be Master Chief."

The orb nodded.

"Can it talk?" the Grand General asked.

"We do not believe so," Nome replied. "However, we have seen it levitate objects many orders of magnitude above its own mass, and even create just as massive objects seemingly out of thin air. I have seen it create blocks of all sizes, and even vehicles as heavy as Scorpion Class tanks. It was invaluable at defending us from the Reds during the battle at the center of the Abyss of Absentmindedness."

"I see," the Grand General replied. "A worthy asset, no doubt. And one necessary for you to complete the mission I have for you."

"Mission?" Skope asked.

"I'll get to that," said the Grand General. "But first, I need to make sure you know everything you need to. You already know that there are six armies at this point in the war, not just three, and that the latter three, the Reds, Purples, and Oranges, emerged only recently. Not something terribly worrying. I doubt any of you have been on the front lines long enough to remember, but there was a time when new armies would appear almost every week. The Orange and Purple Armies were defeated a few years ago, the Purples at Roster Teth and the Oranges even earlier, back at the Battle of Earth. The Yellow/Blue alliance finished them off, I believe. The Reds are the only exception, because until recently we have never seen them before."

"And if we suspect from our journey in the other universe is correct," said Nome, "Then the Red Army was once a people who lived in the forest at the center of the Abyss of Absentmindedness, but was recruited into a fighting force by persons we do not yet know about."

"Well said," complimented the Grand General. "Furthermore, these three armies have been fighting their own private war on the other hemisphere of the planet. A war our three armies has missed due to our own problems. And I think that covers all but one of the facts you should know."

"And…what don't we know?" Jess asked.

The Grand General sighed. "I am sure you saw outside the remnants of the attack that happened here just a few hours ago."

"Oh yeah," said Kenny. "I think there's a Falcon still stuck inside that one building. You should probably send some guys to take care of it before it falls and hurts someone-"

A screeching, rumbling crash sounded from outside, followed by a loud metallic crunch, cries of shock, and the sound of a woman screaming "No, my baby!"

"Never mind," Kenny corrected.

The Grand General motioned to one of the soldiers who had escorted the Greens to him. The solder saluted and ran outside to take care of things. Not knowing what else could be done, the Greens all turned back to face the Grand General.

"So, who attacked us?" Skope asked.

"Tactically speaking, the Orange Army is still attacking us, from underneath the city," the Grand General replied.

"What?" the Greens shouted in unison.

"The Orange Army is attacking us from under the city," the Grand General repeated. "Somehow, they gained teleporter access to the large underground bunker which used to be Green Command before we moved up to the city. It is completely abandoned. Or rather, _was_ completely abandoned, until the Oranges showed up there somehow and decided to launch and air strike on us."

"An air strike?" Skope asked. "But um, didn't you say that they were attacking from under the surface of the planet?"

"They bored tunnels large enough to fit Pelicans through by using explosives on preexisting access tunnels," the Grand General explained. "And they managed to open the few aircraft tunnels and VTOL pads that were already there.

"They launched an air strike from underground," Jess thought aloud. "Nuts."

"And it worked," said Kenny. "What the fuck?"

The Grand General gave a frustrated sigh and explained: "The city was designed to be defended from the inside against the outer perimeter, because that's where all the teleporters to get here are located…except the one underneath the city that we'd basically forgotten about until now. When the Oranges attacked us, we were caught completely by surprise. Our forces were stationed on the perimeter, not in the center of the city. That included AA weaponry. We were caught with our pants all the way down. That goddamn bunker's the perfect place to unexpectedly strike at us from."

"Wait...We may already have been in that bunker," postulated Nome to the other Greens.

"Oh?" replied Jess.

"Do you remember when we had gone through the light portal in the Abyss and come into the large concrete chamber?" Nome asked. "Just before we made our second jump?"

"Oh, yeah!" said Kenny. "Those dudes! Wait...they were in orange armor!"

"Yeah, and one of them said something like 'I thought you said this place was supposed to be abandoned' and then another guy said 'It is, I thought the Greens had left here a long time ago' and then a third guy said something else," Jess added.

"And then they all started shooting at us and we went back through the portal again and finally got back to our real base. Yeah, I remember all that shit. Intense stuff," Kenny finished.

"Sure thing," Skope commented. "But I think the important thing to remember about that is that it looked underground and the Oranges said that our Army had left it a long time ago."

"Indeed," said Nome. He turned to the Grand General. "You see, it would seem we have already been to the underground bunker of the Oranges, if only for a very brief period of time."

"Excellent," the Grand General said with a tone that raised hairs in the Greens, while clasping his hands together. "This is perfect. Here is my mission; you, along with the orb, will go down to the underground bunker, and you will use the orb to take out all of the Orange soldiers you find down there. That is your first objective. Your second is to find the teleporter or device or method they are using of getting into the bunker and take it out, so that they cannot attack us from under the city again."

"What?" the Greens repeated in unison.

"You want the four of us to go down there...against who knows how many Orange soldiers?" Skope stated.

"With the orb as your main weapon," the Grand General confirmed. "Though you will of course have access to the best weaponry we have to offer as well."

"On second thought, I'm really starting to like this plan," said Kenny.

"It's suicide!" countered Jess.

"It is also the last hope for the city," said the Grand General. "And furthermore, if this orb really is capable of so much, then you should have little trouble. But just in case you do, I have a squad of eight men who will travel down there with you. All among our finest."

"So now it's slightly less suicidal," said Jess. "But what choice do we have now? The General's right, the city is in danger."

"I smell promotion..." Kenny muttered to himself.

"Let's just hope the guys we have to fight with aren't jerks," said Skope.

The Greens heard a crowd of footsteps on the stairs, and turned to find the eight soldiers the Grand General had mentioned coming up to meet them. As soon as they reached the top, they formed into a practiced line and unisonly shouted: "Reporting for duty, sir!"

The Grand General stepped forward to the leftmost soldier in the line. "This is Colonel Moran. He will be leading this operation."

"Permission to speak, sir?" Colonel Moran asked the Grand General.

"Permission granted," the Grand General replied.

To the Greens, Colonel Moran asked: "Are you the guys from Sector 18-Alpha?"

The Greens nodded.

"Well then, which one of you is Lieutenant Christopher Skope?"

"I'd prefer if you'd just call me by my last name," said Skope.

"How about if I call you Sniperbutt?"

"Ah, fuck!"


	27. PURPLE BASE

An hour before dawn was supposed to break, Patton, Hester, Hearts, and Inez set out from their base. All of them wore the specialty-modified armor attachments Lemon was infamous for. Hester wore a Commando field command support set, Hearts was weighed down with extra sniper ammo on his shoulders and random extra mags in a Long Range Patrol chest pouch set, and Inez, befitting her role as the squads replacement close-quarters trooper, carried extra shotgun shells on her chest and wrist. Even Patton had pulled his old Lemon airman gear out of storage; his pilot helmet with the full-face black visor now covered his head, and the shoulder pads, small modular attachments that bore Lemon Squadrons insignia (a square with small triangles touching each of its four points) were now attached to his armor in place of his usual shoulder pads.

He'd also brought out something else; Inez's original helmet, which she had given to him for safe keeping while she recovered from the loss of her arm. Inez was now wearing it, the skull she had carved into its visor mimicking the grin she had given Patton when he presented it to her.

Quietly and in sync, Lemon boarded the Falcon, and headed due north, according to the coordinates the Purple spy had given them during his interrogation. The next few kilometers went by in a flash; Joshua Wilson (or Travis Chamaelon, which was apparently his real name) may have been a Purple spy, but the improvements he had made to the VTOL in the brief time he had been working at the base were actually quite helpful. Patton couldn't help but admire the way it moved now; it seemed to have a liquid grace to it, like its living namesake. It was actually a joy to fly now, the last vestige of its time with the Blues erased.

And so, the members of Lemon Squadron reached their destination in no time. Just a few minutes after they had taken to the air, Hearts spotted the large fissure in the ground that, according to Chamaelon, was the entrance to the Purple base in the Wilderness. It appeared as a gash in the landscape, a wound in the rock through which (from the Falcon's altitude) could be seen a cavern filled with odd dark shapes.

Hearts pointed it out to Hester, who banged her fist on the underside of the troop bay. Patton, hearing the designated non-radio signal for "target spotted", quickly confirmed the fissure's location and set the Falcon on the ground near it. Everyone piled out efficiently, moving to their assigned positions with the ease of a team forged in the fire of combat.

Hearts went prone, crawled up to the hole, and looked through it with his sniper scope. "Looks clear so far," he reported over Lemon's secure Com channel. "No Purples in sight, but it looks like there's a waterfall or something down there with a bridge going across it."

"How big?" Hester queried.

"Big enough to land on."

"Good. Cover me, I'm going in," said Hester. She uncoiled a rope from her ammo pouch and attached it to the waist of her armor. After tying the edge to a sturdy tree, she put her legs into the hole and swiftly rappelled down into it. Almost instantly there came the sound of automatic gunfire, which ended almost as quickly as it had started.

"Tango's down," Hester called back up calmly. "Just a two man welcoming party that was out of view from up there. It's safe to come down now."

Without further hesitation, the other three members of Lemon Squadron rappelled to Hester's location. They landed on a bridge platform suspended over an underground pool of water. Two doors on either end of the platform led into the mainland of the base. Behind them roared the origin of the water; the huge falls Hearts had noticed from the surface.

Hearts looked around and commented: "Well, at least we know we're in the right place."

"Solid copy," replied Patton replied, while admiring their surroundings for himself. "Everything's…purple."

And he was right. Of the actual base, nearly every surface was some shade between red and blue, with very few exceptions.

"Who the hell are you guys…um…stop right there!" came a voice from their left. Lemon turned to find a Purple soldier pointing an assault rifle shakily at them. Before they could do anything about him, he was soon joined by many other soldiers with assault rifles, who began firing at the Yellows.

"Shit, there's too many of them." Hester spat.

"We can take 'em." Patton replied confidently. Being back with in action with his old team had gotten him a good mood.

"Sorry Commander, no blazes of glory today." Hester replied as she motioned for the other three members of Lemon Squadron to follow her down the opposite end of the corridor. The Purple's fire followed them as they moved.

They rushed through the door on the opposite end of the bridge platform, and Inez hit a control panel with her robotic arm which closed the door and locked it. For good measure, she smashed her fist into the panel and ripped out its internal workings, permanently sealing the door. The Purples on the other side of the door pounded on it for a few seconds, then stopped, probably leaving to get a torch to cut their way through.

"Okay, where are we now?" Patton asked, glancing around.

They were in a small room with a ramp that wove up the corner of the room. He also saw large pipes extend across one end of the room to the other, held up by a large rectangular pillar with rounded edges.

"Some kind of pumping station for that pool, maybe?" Hearts suggested.

"Looks like it," said Hester. "We don't have long in here. The Purples are going to cut through the door any minute. Hopefully there's another entrance up that ramp."

She lead the way, with Lemon following providently behind.

Indeed they did find another door at the top of the ramp. It led into a short corridor from which there were three possible paths to take. Hearts quickly tested the leftmost path and discovered it was just a ledge overlooking the pool. A dead end, but several soldiers were standing on the bridge platform, and opened fire as soon as they noticed Hearts looking at them. He jumped back as gunfire whizzed past him, the 7.62 millimeter bullets pinging off of the walls. "Not this way," he informed the others, blind firing his sniper rifle over his shoulder.

Patton made for the middle path, but a reinforced door slid in place to block him with a hiss of hydraulics. "Those bastards are sealing off the exits!" he shouted, slamming the door in frustration.

The last, rightmost, door began to close as well, but Inez slid her robotic arm in just in time, and the door was kept ajar. Grunting with effort and rage, she forced the door back just enough to wedge the rest of her arm into it and hold it open. The gap left by her prosthetic wasn't huge, but it was large enough to let everyone through. Once Hester, Patton, and Hearts had made it, she maneuvered herself through as well. The door slammed shut behind her, missing the tips of her metal fingers by centimeters.

The room the Yellows now found themselves in the lower part of what looked to be a control room. The part they were in held another curved ramp and some electronic supplies. The upper part was a platform, and on it were a pair of holographic control consoles as well as three Purple soldiers, who all turned to face Lemon.

"How the hell did they get in here?" one soldier shouted at the others. "I thought you sealed off the doors!"

"I did!" shouted another in panic. "It didn't stop them!"

Everyone opened fire at more or less the same time. Bullets flew everywhere.

It was the completely chaotic battles like this one that Lemon Squadron was trained to deal with, and deal with it they did. The inaccurate spray from the Purple's assault rifles prevented them from doing any significant damage to the Yellow's shields, and Lemon Squadron took advantage of this by using their designated marksman rifles to pick off the enemy before they even had a chance. A couple of seconds later the three Purples were dead and things calmed down a bit. The air stunk of gunfire and spent brass. Patton inhaled happily, relishing it.

"I think one of those control panels should be able to reopen the other corridors," said Hearts.

"Already on it," said Inez. She strode up the ramp and to the control panel and began hitting buttons like she had been trained in the consoles operation for a lifetime. "Opening all the doors now. And hey; looks like there's a teleporter on the other side of the base. Guess that's how they get reinforcements in."

"Good," said Hester. "We just need to get over to the teleporter, plant the explosives, and escape."

The Yellows had come with explosives because they knew it was the most efficient way to get rid of any base.

"I do love simple plans when it comes to explosions," Patton said.

"Got that right." Hearts said while tossing up and catching the "blast package" in his right hand. "And this isn't some wimpy compound like nitro or semtex either. This is the good stuff, pure C12. This place is gonna go up so damn good!"

"Yeah, well, we still have to get to the teleporter first," said Hester. "Don't get cocky just yet."

Inez finished hitting buttons on the console. "I've permanently opened all doors leading to the teleporter and locked out most of the Purples from the system." she reported. "Let's go."

The Yellows retreated back to the hallway fork, this time choosing the middle leading from the corner of the room. They came into a wide hallway with a semitransparent wall on the right side which looked out into more of the cavern system. And at the other end of the hallway were more Purple soldiers. A _lot_ more Purple soldiers.

In seconds, bullets started flying all over the place, and the Yellows were again forced to take cover, this time behind the several pillars that lined the hallway.

"I thought this was supposed to be a stealth operation," Hearts remarked sarcastically as he systematically took down Purples with his sniper rifle without using its scope. They weren't far enough away to warrant it. "We pop in, check out the place, plant the explosives before anyone notices, and then pop out and hit the detonation switch."

"Subtlety is overrated," stated Patton. "And besides, what the hell is supposed to be subtle about a C12 explosion?"

He then cursed, tossed his now ammo-less DMR away, pulled Lucy from his back, and took down a few nearby Purples with her.

"Shit." Inez swore as well. Patton noticed that she was holding her own shotgun, a standard model inferior to Lucy. The slide was stuck, jamming an empty shell in the receiver. At the other end of the conflict, a Purple apparently deciding he wanted to get up close and personal, pulled out a combat knife and charged forward.

"Catch." He called, tossing Lucy into the air. Inez caught the shotgun midway, slamming it to her shoulder and firing it in one motion, taking out the Purple charging them.

"Thanks." Inez tossed Lucy back, and Patton caught the shotgun reverently. He reached down and relieved the Purple of his assault rifle.

"Well, that's a point I guess," revised Hearts, who'd actually waited till Patton and Inez had finished to continue. "Still, Pinkie, I'd rather not get into firefights like this one if I don't have to."

"Well it's a bit late for that now," noted Hester while continuing to take down Purples with her DMR. "The explosion part of the plan is still doable though."

"And I look forward to it very much!" Hearts shouted back.

"Aren't we all?" called out Patton.

By now the numbers of Purples was diminishing down to near nothing. Hearts popped the head on the last one, and with that the firefight was over. "I think we're between waves," he reported, slamming a new magazine into his sniper.

"Then let's move." Hester ordered. Without further pause the Yellows rushed the rest of the way through the hallway and into the room beyond.

This room was similar to the control room they'd been in previously, with two levels and holographic control consoles on the upper one, except that this time there was a teleporter in the corner of the room.

"Perfect." Patton muttered. "Just what we were looking for. Get that charge planted."

"Hang on a moment Patton," ordered Hester. She approached one of the consoles. "This terminal keeps their bases recordings. I want to get what info we can before we leave."

"Good point. No intel is bad intel."

"Exactly." Hester nodded to Inez, who strode over and hit a few buttons. This brought up a screen.

"Got something." She reported. "I think this is their war journal. We should have time to watch it before reinforcements get to us."

She hit a final button and a holographic screen popped up. The recording began.

A Purple soldier with the strutted chest pads of a high rank took up the screen, and judging from the background he was standing where the Yellows were now. "It has now been two weeks since we arrived here," he reported. "The Reds don't seem to know we've taken up residence and have focused entirely on combating the Yellow, Green, and Blue bases in this area. A team of four Reds seemed to be doing most of the attacking. Theirs was the only Red base here we had complete confirmation of, though recently the Yellows, Greens, and Blues launched a joint assault on them, supposedly taking them out. I am hoping that those four were the only Reds stationed in this Wilderness, though I cannot confirm this."

"Let's hope he's right," Hearts commented. "Or we're going to need to get the rest of the team down here."

The Purple on the screen continued: "With the help of our newfound technology, this base was relatively easy to take up. The mechanics and techs have been able to reverse engineer most of the alien tech so that we can now use it, and we are implementing it into combat as quickly as possible. I think the base is coming along nicely, and it should be ready in case our war in the other hemisphere ends badly, and the others need to retreat here. I realize that our comrades in the other hemisphere are far less fortunate then we are, because while the Reds over here may have been neutralized for the time being, our forces on the other side of the planet have been fighting the Reds nonstop ever since that Army emerged…seemingly from out of nowhere."

"Stop it a moment," requested Hester. After Inez complied, she asked: "Did I hear him say the words 'alien tech'?"

"Yup, he definitely said it," confirmed Patton. "And I've gotta say, the architecture here does look weird as hell. I've certainly never seen it anywhere other than here. I'd believe that it's alien. We should definitely look into this."

"Maybe by asking that spy about it." Hearts suggested.

"Sounds like a plan." Hester agreed. "It's not like we can study this place thoroughly, since we're about to blow the shit out of it."

"Agreed. On that, we probably don't have that much time left," stated Hester. "We need to finish this ASAP. Patton, start setting those charges."

"Yes ma'am." Patton promptly set about placing the C12 charges at important points all over the room.

She gestured to Inez, who pressed the play button on the recording, and it continued.

The Purple soldier on-screen elaborated: "I have heard rumors that the Reds are getting even more ambitious, that they're about to launch an attack on the command center of one of the first three armies, the Yellows, Greens, or Blues. Unfortunately I can't say which one, since my sources are questionable at best. However, I must say that the Reds do appear to have enough manpower and resources to pull it off. In lieu of the fact that the Reds destroyed the Green's Avalanche Base during their rampage through the Wilderness, I have reassigned our spy agent, Travis Chamealon, to a nearby Yellow base in the canyon. Hopefully he will be able to give us more leads on this subject-"

"I hear footsteps," Hearts interrupted. "And lots of them."

"I think we got enough information out of this," Hester said. Inez canceled the rest of the recording and hit a few more keys.

"All right, I've calibrated the teleporters exit node to be just outside the base." She explained. "And I've retracted the blast shields around the base's main power supply. The overpressure wave from our C12 should be enough to set the whole thing off."

"Right. If the plastic doesn't do the job, the power supply will. Let's get the fuck out." Hester did a quick check of her team. "Patton, you done?"

"Just about." Patton wedged the last C12 packet into one of the support columns of the building. "Finished. All charges primed and ready."

The Yellows made for the teleporter, but as they did so a Purple soldier unexpectedly appeared from one of the ventilation ducts near that same side of the room. This soldier was carrying a giant armload of electronic equipment, which was apparently so top heavy that he had to move side to side in order to keep it balanced. He was clearly a mechanic, one of the engineers who was tasked with "reverse engineering the alien tech" that the Purple in the recording had referred to.

Realizing the possible importance of the material the soldier was carrying, Hearts rushed over to the mechanic and placed the spare C12 package he'd carried with him on the very top of the pile of things he was holding. "Here, hold onto this for me," Hearts asked him.

The added weight made the mechanic stagger even more. "Huh… _What?_ " He exclaimed as he realized that he person talking to him had golden armor on.

"Gotta go, bye!" Hearts called back to the mechanic as he followed the other members of Lemon Squadron through the teleporter.

He emerged right next to the Falcon that Yellows had used to travel to the base, which was about thirty meters from the hole in the ground they had rappelled down into.

"Get in." Hester ordered. She and Inez were already inside, with Patton in the cockpit running through an abbreviated preflight check.

Hearts jumped aboard, and Patton sent the Falcon skyward. As they pulled away, Inez retrieved the C12 remote detonator from her ammo pouch.

"Time to blow this joint." She chuckled. "You all better watch. Don't wanna miss this!"

She hit the button, and a second later the hole in the ground erupted with fire as well as a tremendous roar. Seconds later, there was a much larger explosion, one that caused the whole hillside to bulge. Debris soared skyward, forming a glittering cloud, before succumbing to gravity and falling to earth once again.

"I do love explosions," Patton commented over the intercom from the pilot's seat. "It was worth coming here just to see that."

"Rah to that, brother!" Hearts agreed, pumping his fist.

"And now we need to go," said Hester. "Time to have a few words with the spy about this supposed alien tech."

The Yellows took a few more moments to observe the results of the explosion, making sure their target was eliminated. Then Patton spun the Falcon around and began the return to base.


	28. OPERATION DOWNBELOW

The Greens were escorted by their new squad, led by Colonel Moran, to the elevator which would take them under the city to the underground bunker which supposedly held an Orange attack force. The doors opened to reveal a car about five by five meters square, enough for all twelve soldiers fully armored soldiers to fit easily inside with plenty of room to spare. Master Chief floated in behind them, since he was supposed to be the main weapon of the operation, according to the Grand General.

The leader of the Green Army stared at them from the door of the elevator. "Spare no mercy for the Oranges, and ensure that they never live to attack this city again," he ordered speech wise to the soldiers. "Know that the fate of this city hangs in the balance of your actions. You must succeed here."

"It shall be done, Grand General," Colonel Moran replied, snapping a salute. The rest of his team followed, Nome's group seconds after.

The Grand General nodded at all of them and returned the salute. "Operation Downbelow is now in effect. Good luck to all of you."

With that the doors closed and the elevator began its long descent. Elevator music began playing. It was an authentic mix of things, thankfully none of which was normal elevator music. Perhaps as a force of habit, everyone began to shift around uncomfortably. Despite the fact that they were about to fight for the fate of the city, everyone was making it seem like an office building elevator at the start of a long and boring work day. And, for some of them, that was actually partially true. Kenny was about to yawn, but remembered that he was in the presence of eight elite soldiers and stopped himself.

"How long is this ride supposed to last?" Skope asked Colonel Moran.

"Five minutes, Lieutenant Sniperbutt," Moran responded without a hint of sarcasm.

"Um, it's Skope."

"Really? That's not what I heard."

"Oh really?" Skope pressed. "What did you hear then?"

"I heard that about five days ago you were sniped in the ass by a Yellow."

"But my name is still Skope."

Moran shook his head. "As leader of this operation, not to mention a superior, I can address you as I please. And in light of your recent…episode…I hereby title you Lieutenant Sniperbutt."

"Oh, c'mon!" Skope protested angrily. "Even the Yellows don't call me that. I met the person who sniped me, you know. She's not actually that bad of a person."

"Uh-huh," said Moran slowly. "And what did the Yellows call you, then?"

"A nasty seaweed colored Green. And a couple other things. But that's beside the point-"

"And to us, you will always be Sniperbutt, because we hold you in such high esteem. Isn't that right, boys?"

Moran nodded over to the seven soldiers directly under his command, and they all started laughing.

Skope sighed in disgust, though he took a small amount of comfort from the fact that most of the laugher sounded forced.

"Just don't even bother with them," Jess said quietly to Skope. "We just need to get through this operation, and then we won't need to be around them anymore."

"Assuming that we outlast the operation," interjected Nome. "According to the numbers we will likely face, our survival is not guaranteed by any modification of the equation."

"Thanks for cheering me up, Nome," Skope replied sarcastically. "Thanks so fucking much!" He spent the rest of the ride with his arms crossed while everyone else shuffled around the elevator car uneasily.

Finally the elevator began to decelerate. Everyone hastily readied their weapons and checked their armor.

"Everyone get ready," Moran ordered. "This is it."

The doors opened. No one there. Ahead was a concrete hallway, but it was completely empty. The Greens looked at each other nervously.

"Proceed forward," Moran ordered. "Quietly!"

Two of Moran's soldiers inched along the hallway a step at a time, making no noise even in their armor. Without warning they were assaulted by concentrated fire from a hallway on their left. With practiced speed, the two soldiers took cover behind the doors as bullets whizzed by their heads.

"The rest of you, get out there and help them!" Moran ordered the rest of the Greens. "There's only a couple of them. We can take them easily."

They sprang into action. Kenny sprinted up to the doorway, tossed a grenade through it, and then took cover himself. As soon as it went off, Skope took advantage of the Orange's shock to pick off some of them from a distance with his sniper rifle. Staring down the hallway, Skope noticed that there were at least six Orange soldiers in just this part of the bunker. He managed to take one of them down with a headshot, but the other five found cover before he could get fire a second time.

Moran turned to look at Nome. "Hey, where's that floating orb you brought with you? I thought it was supposed to be able to make stuff."

"It is," Nome replied.

"How 'bout a rocket launcher?"

A fully loaded rocket launcher clanked to the ground in front of Moran. The Colonel looked up to see Master Chief hovering above him, bobbing happily.

"Thanks, little guy," Moran responded to it.

"Dude, you can spawn weapons?" Kenny asked Master Chief in awe. "What can't you do?"

"Sure could have used that when we were fighting those Reds..." Skope grumbled.

Moran picked up the launcher, aimed down the corridor, and let the first of the launcher's two loaded rockets fly down it. The sound of several screams alongside the explosion and the sudden appearance of a half-slagged assault rifle on the floor confirmed that he had hit his mark. "Corridor is clear. Everyone move, now!"

The Greens rushed down the corridor. The hallway itself turned out not to be a hallway at all, but rather an edge that looked out upon the main room of the bunker.

The Greens recognized it immediately. It was the same large chamber they'd seen when escaping though the light portal from the Abyss of Absentmindedness. This corridor looked out on it from a perch, as opposed to their first time here, when they'd been on the bottom floor of the chamber. And in the center of this large chamber was something that hadn't been here the first time the Greens had visited; an array of teleporter nodes, surrounded by about a dozen Orange soldiers, lay along the floor of the chamber. As the Greens watched, a Falcon suddenly appeared just above the array with a brilliant flash.

"A teleporter array. So that's how they're getting in all the vehicles!" Moran exclaimed. "We need to get down there and take it offline. Sniperbutt, take point."

"It's Skope," Skope corrected quietly. Moran completely ignored him.

On the other wall of the corridor they found the exit of a large pipe that had air blowing out of it. Its purpose remained a mystery for the next few seconds, until an Orange soldier flew out at them from it, rifle at his side. Moran didn't give him a chance to react; he punched the Orange directly in the face, and he was unconscious before he even hit the ground. The Greens pressed on, searching for more hostiles. They found a last remaining soldier at the end of the hallway, the survivor of the rocket blast Moran had unleashed a minute earlier. Slightly injured from the blast, he was put down almost instantly.

After the corridor came another corridor with some stairs leading down. The Greens cautiously progressed down it, fortunately not encountering any more Oranges. It appeared that the rest of the Orange soldiers were in the main chamber overseeing the teleporter array, which also explained why they had not become aware of the Greens yet, even with the rocket explosion. Down the stairs and through a final corridor, and the Greens emerged into the main chamber.

Nome noted that they were now standing (ironically) exactly where they had emerged from the portal the day before. From this view, they could tell that there were maybe twenty Oranges, as opposed to the dozen they could see from up above. Some of them had been standing under the first floor ceiling. From this same view, the eight new Oranges could also see them.

"Intruders!" one Orange shouted. Everyone turned to face the Greens weapons drawn. So did the Falcon, its twin turrets swiveling to get a bead on the Greens.

"Oh shit," Moran spat. "This just got one fuck of a lot more interesting." He shouldered the rocket launcher.

The air became thick with flying bullets as the Greens scrambled for cover in the corridor they had emerged from.

"There are too many enemies for us to fight directly," Nome reported. "We must find some other way."

"That Falcon is the real problem," said Jess. "We need it taken down somehow."

Skope put in: "I agree. If they didn't have aerial support then we might be able to strike back."

"Hey, Moran's got that rocket launcher." Kenny noted. "Why don't we-"

Their conversation was interrupted by the sound of a shattering crash. They peeked their heads out of cover slightly to discover that their wish had come true. A Scorpion class tank had fallen from out of nowhere, landing squarely on top of the Falcon. Slamming against the tank's bottom, the rotor blades of the VTOL shattered and flew everywhere in shards. The engines under them caught fire instantly as debris filled their inner workings. Under the weight of the 66 tonne tank and lacking power, the Falcon began to fall. The Greens continued to watch in awed silence as the Falcon and tank reached the ground, upon which the Falcon was squashed under the tank like a fiery tin can, exploding with fury. The tank survived, miraculously. The force of the blast annihilated the teleporter array, sending teleporter parts everywhere and ruining the delicate alignment structure. No longer able to connect to the other side, the array shut down, with all of the teleporters still standing losing their green pillar of light.

This sequence of events had the effect of complete decomposition of the Orange's morale. As the Orange soldiers stared in stunned panic at the mess before them, as small metallic orb floated down from the top of the chamber. All it took was Master Chief to levitate the newly spawned tank off of the ground, and Oranges were running everywhere in fear.

This was exactly the opportunity the Greens were looking for. They leapt into the chamber, taking down Oranges as they chaotically scurried all over the place. The next two minutes were spent taking back the bunker. These efforts were helped along greatly by Kenny, who diligently and happily hopped into the tank used its turret to blow away all Orange soldiers in his view. Before long all enemies in the bunker had been neutralized.

Everyone gathered in the center of the main chamber, next to the tank and on top of the spot where the teleporter array used to be. "That was brilliant!" Moran said to Master Chief.  
"The Grand General was correct, this is the ultimate weapon."

"Yeah, you go, Master Chief!" Kenny commented, pumping his fist. The orb did a victory swoop around the room.

"Though we have triumphed over the Oranges in this bunker, we still must discover exactly how the Oranges established the teleporter array here in the first place," said Nome. "Those terminals over there most likely have the information we need." He pointed over to a series of computer terminals at the far end of the main chamber.

"Good idea," agreed Moran. "We can report to the Grand General as soon as we have gained all information we can about this army as well. Two birds with one stone."

Everyone followed Nome over to the terminals, and the medic began poking through the information, his gauntleted fingers moving over the keyboard with expert speed. "Mmmmmm," he postulated out loud to himself. "Yes, this is very curious."

"What is it, Nome?" Skope asked.

Nome explained: "According to these logs, the teleporter array was originally stolen Red technology. The Oranges gained control over this specific array after a recent battle against the Reds, one of their very few victories against them, apparently."

"So then, the Reds have more of these arrays? Moran asked.

"Yes." Nome answered. "And if what the writer of this log is saying, they can use them to break into places at any time."

"Guess we know why the Oranges have been having so much trouble fighting the Reds." Skope noted.

"Exactly," Nome replied. "Furthermore, this Orange attack here was actually an opportunistic response to the fact that the Reds have, within the last six hours, moved their focus away from the Orange and Purple armies. The Reds are using their own arrays to attack a target of their own choosing, and the Oranges took advantage of their enemy's absence to launch an attack on us, hoping to take this city and gain its resources to use against the Reds and Purples in later battles."

"But how did the Oranges even know about this city?" Jess asked. "It's supposed to be a secret known only by Greens."

"Highest priority as well." Skope added on. "Not to be revealed even under pain of interrogation by the enemy."

"The Reds have somehow gained knowledge of this city, as well as the Command Centers of all other armies, through use of some advanced scanning technology," Nome continued to explain. "The Oranges don't seem to know much about it, but when they stole this array they gained some of that information, enough to know about Centerpoint City. With this teleporter array gone, the Oranges will not be able to return here. However, the Reds are known to have many more of these arrays, which they can apparently use to link to any location."

"Okay, that sounds super bad," Kenny commented. "Am I the only one who's more than a little worried about this?"

"Actually, there is no cause for immediate worry, at least as far as we are concerned," Nome corrected. "According to this, the Red's chosen target to attack next is Yellow Command, not this city. This siege is likely to begin at any time now." Nome clicked a few more keys before finalizing: "And that is where these logs end. Unfortunately, I can find no information on where or how the Red and Orange armies began."

"It's certainly more than enough information, though," Moran stated. He opened his tacpad. "Sir, Colonel Moran here. The bunker is taken care of. Operation Downbelow was a complete success."

"Excellent," the Grand General's voice said through Moran's helmet mike. "Did you find out how they were getting in?"

"Yes sir. They were using a teleporter array to enter this bunker with vehicles. But we took care of all that. The enemy personnel have been neutralized, and the array is in pieces."

"Wonderful work, my men!" the Grand General congratulated. "This city owes all of you a huge thanks. Did you manage to find anything about the Oranges, by any chance?"

Moran quickly told the Grand General everything Nome had uncovered on the terminals.

"So, you're sure the Reds are about to attack Yellow Command?" the Grand General asked for clarification.

"That's a double positive, sir," Moran replied. "I'm looking at the data right now.

Indeed he was; Nome had brought the relevant information up on the screen again.

The Grand General paused for a moment before stating: "Moran, I need you and your men to stay down there and manage the terminals. But as for Lieutenant Skope's team, I have another mission I need you to undertake."

"Go ahead sir, we're all listening," Skope said into his tacpad, which he and the other Greens had set to the same frequency as Moran's when the conversation had begun.

"The Reds have proven themselves to be vastly more powerful than all other armies, which means that they are our common enemy," the Grand General explained. "I realize that I'm going out on a hell of a limb here by giving you this task, but it is none the less a necessity. Here's what I need you to do."

The Greens looked back and forth between each other as soon as the Grand General had finished explaining their next mission.

"Sir, are you absolutely sure about this?" Jess asked in horror.

"Do not question my orders," shot back the Grand General. "Of course I'm serious."

Kenny thought about asking the Grand General if he'd lost his fucking mind, but then remembered that he was the Grand General, and decided against it. Instead, he said it to himself.

"Um, yessir," was all Skope could think to say. He had thought that taking an underground bunker in order to prevent an air attack was insane, but this was perhaps even more unexpected. But the Grand General had given the Greens their orders, and they would carry them out with little hesitation.


	29. JAIL BREAK

Kevin jerked awake suddenly and looked up to find the Yellow's weapons specialist, Ryan Hobar, staring back at him from the other side of the transparent panel of his cell. Seeing someone who wasn't Inez made him relax a bit. Ryan wasn't quite as threatening as most of the other Yellows, and was a nice change of pace from the human block of steel who normally watched over him. Though, in all honesty, it really wasn't much of a compliment. But it wasn't meant to be one.

Ryan knocked on the panel. "Hey, Green, wake up."

"I'm awake," Kevin replied. "Kind of hard to sleep like this.

"Really? I wouldn't know. But it's good your up, 'cause I wanna ask you some questions," stated Ryan.

"It's my turn to be interrogated, then, is it?" Kevin grunted.

"Not quite," Ryan slowly answered. "I'm just going to have you talk. While still in your cell, sure. But you seem like a pretty easygoing guy, so why bother with an interrogation unless you decide to resist?"

Kevin crossed his arms as much as he could with the neural jammer on. "So is this good cop-bad cop then? As soon as I start being difficult, you're gonna have the medic come in and fire the plasma launcher at me, aren't you? Call in Inez and have her smack me around?"

Ryan laughed. "So I see you've been socializing with the spy. Shouldn't be surprised he's told you all about his little episode in the interrogation room. Plasma launcher? Five hundred credits. Reflective shield walls? Sixty credits. Hearing a Purple spy scream like a five year old on a Starbursts-powered sugar high? Priceless!"

After exhausting his laugh, Ryan took a deep breath.

"Speaking of him..." He looked over to the cell containing the miserable Purple, and saw that…it was empty?

It was. The door to his cell was now open, and on the cell floor sat the neural jammer the Purple had been wearing. _How_ _in_ _the_ _fuck-_

WHACK!

The Yellow hit the ground hard with a _crash_ of ceramic plating. Behind him stood Travis Chamealon, holding the chair from his cell.

Kevin stared back at the Purple in surprise.

"This place is full of jerks," Travis replied, tossing the chair away. He used the keycard he'd stolen from Clair during his interrogation to open Kevin's door, then reached down to him and took off his neural jammer so that he could move properly.

Kevin shifted as he got up, trying to quickly wake up the parts of his body that had fallen asleep from lack of movement. "How did you move enough to open the door? You had a neural jammer on too."

"Neural jammers work by using a magnetic charge to nullify the impulses along your body's spinal cord," Travis explained. He then took out a metallic cylinder about the size and shape of a fat quarter. "But put another magnet of opposite charge near it, and it cancels out some of the neural jammer's magnetic field. Not a lot, but enough to get it off. It's really that simple. Struggling in my cell to reach for this thing took a while, but it was worth the wait, wouldn't you say?"

Kevin nodded. "Hell yeah!" He stood and shook himself, trying to rid his body of the nasty tingling feeling that invaded his nerves. "Now let's get out of here. I'm sure that whoever's in the monitoring room has noticed we've broken out by now. We need to move."

"Agreed."

The Green and the Purple tromped quickly over Ryan's unconscious body and hurried out the prison sector door.

"I think we should make for the warehouse," Travis said quickly. "We can take their Falcon before they know what's happening.

"Good plan," said Kevin. "You lead the way."

* * *

Clair was pleasantly bored as she sat back in the monitoring room swivel chair. It had been a long morning, what with the fact that the ever accident prone Brian had almost destroyed the kitchen. AGAIN. This time, instead of attempting to microwave his magnum, he'd decided to try storing his designated marksman rifle ammo ( _a_ _dozen_ _full_ _mags_ _of_ _it!_ ) in the oven, liking the fact that it had so much empty space without the extra ammunition cluttering his room, but failing to realize that as soon as someone else (Clair) turned the oven on, it would transform the kitchen into a free fire zone.

But she'd cleaned it up thoroughly, and hoped that when Patton and the rest of Lemon Squadron returned from their operation at the supposed Purple Base nearby, they wouldn't realize anything had happened while they'd been gone. At least the fake lemonade had been saved from the near catastrophe, courtesy of the steel reinforced refrigerator door Patton had installed back when he first took command of the base. She supposed that would be enough to keep Lemon Squadron happy should they come to wonder why the kitchen looked in places like Swiss cheese from the many bullets that had ping-ponged everywhere, and why the oven door had been completely annihilated.

Now that that situation had been contained, she was finally free to relax in the security monitoring room. For once in a long while she'd managed to keep up with the many tasks of her responsibility. Though a lot of this had been due to that Purple spy, who for obvious reasons could help her no longer. But she honestly didn't mind. An ass-hole and a liar he might be, but it didn't change the fact that he'd actually helped.

Speaking of the Purple...she remembered that Ryan had gone down to the prison sector to ask both the Purple and the Green some questions. Not something he usually did, but he was probably just trying to teach himself to be an interrogator, having seen her do it so well last evening. Either that, or he was hoping to impress the members of Lemon. It was quite obvious he was in awe of them.

In any case, Clair decided that it might be worth watching, if only to see the weapons specialist fail miserably at getting anything more out of the prisoners.

She pulled up that monitor feed on one of the laptops, stopping immediately in her thoughts. Both cell doors were open, the cells themselves empty, and on the floor lay Ryan's still body. For a moment she was afraid he was dead, but a quick check of his armor's biometric readings showed him to be alive but unconscious.

However, there was still the fact that the prisoners had escaped.

"Shit!" she exclaimed in frustration. She opened up a COM with the one remaining person in the base who could help her deal with this. "Stone, come in!" she commanded.

"Clair?" came a hesitant response. "What's going on?"

"We've got a situation. The prisoners have escaped!"

"What? Crap! Ryan went down there!"

"I know. He's out cold."

"Son of a bitch! Where're the prisoners heading?"

Clair hurriedly sifted through the feeds, finally coming upon one that had a flash of them in view. "Traveling together, corridor 2-B. Looks like they're headed towards the warehouse."

"The warehouse?" Amber asked. "But why? There's no way out of there except the Falcon, and Lemon took that for their mission."

"But they don't know that," Clair realized. "We can corner them!"

"Already on my way there," Amber replied.

"Alright. I'm going to stay at the security console. I'll try and steer them towards you and give you a heads up when they're near."

"Sounds like a plan. Let's do this."

* * *

"Almost there!" Travis informed Kevin as he broke into a full run. The two of them burst through the door into the warehouse. Late morning sunlight greeted them through the transparent window that made up the wall on the opposite side of the massive room. But on the landing pad, there was no Falcon.

"Wait, where is it?" Travis exclaimed, running towards the landing pad. "It should be here!"

"That's because Lemon Squadron is taking it for a ride right now. Just missed it, sorry." a voice from behind them exclaimed. The Purple and Green turned to find Amber staring at them from atop a perch near the room's ceiling…through the scope of a sniper rifle.

"Sorry to put the breaks on your little escape attempt," Amber continued slowly.

Kevin threw his hands up in the air. "Fuck, it was a trap!"

"Actually it wasn't," Amber corrected. "You both just happened to run into a place where you'd be easily cornered."

"I won't let you take me again," Travis shouted. He hit a button on his tacpad, then began running. But then _two_ of him were running.

Amber stared in confusion through her rifle's scope. It was as though the Purple had split into two identical versions of himself.

"What the hell?" she murmured to herself. She decided to take the left one out, aiming for the Purple's legs to incapacitate him. She fired, the rifle's report echoing through the warehouse. Upon contact with the round, the Purple suddenly disappeared with a fizzle of electrical energy.

"A hologram," Amber realized aloud. "He made a holographic decoy of himself."

She fired off a second round, this time at the real Travis Chamealon, which missed him barely but stopped him in his tracks as it infiltrated his path and blew a large hole in the ground. Amber steadied herself and was about to get a clear shot on the Purple, but then he suddenly dove out of the way with an impressive roll, and Amber struggled to deal with his erratic movement. A good a sniper as she was, it was hard to hit a moving target.

Meanwhile, Kevin had realized that the window overlooking the Wilderness had begun to slide into the side of the room, opening up for…that Falcon that had just come into view.

"Oh, shit!" he exclaimed. "I think Lemon Squadron is back!"

Sure enough, Patton's voice came in clear over Amber's COM just a few moments later. "Stone, we got a situation here?"

"The Green and Purple are trying to escape," Amber replied. "Got 'em cornered. Orders?"

"Hold your position" said Hester. "We'll handle this."

The Falcon swung around, allowing those inside a clear shot at the two escapees.

Noticing that one of the Yellows in the Falcon had a rocket launcher, Kevin was presented with the awkward memory of being blown unconscious by a rocket fired from this very same aircraft. As just as memory served, a rocket came roaring towards him. But this time Kevin was ready, his instincts honed and fueled by fear and adrenaline. He ran at the wall and leaped, using the force of the rocket explosion behind him to carry him further up it. As soon as he reached the apex of his jump, he kicked off. His trajectory made him fly far above the floor…and straight onto the outside of the Falcon's cockpit.

Patton reacted in surprise, attempting to swerve the VTOL and shake the Green off the windshield. But before he could, Kevin reached for the rim of the canopy, took hold of it, and pried it open with a groan of hydraulics. Then he swung his feet into the cockpit, knocking the stunned Commander out of it before he could do anything to react. He hit the ground with a groan, but stood up almost immediately with a roar of anger.

Wondering what the commotion was about, the other three members of Lemon Squadron looked into the cockpit and realized that Patton had been replaced by a Green soldier. Hester, who was the closest, lunged for him. Kevin responded by ramming the VTOL against the wall, the force of which was enough to toss Hester, Hearts, and Inez over the mounted machine gun turret and out of the aircraft.

"He-he's taken the Falcon!" Patton shouted at Amber as he charged after the retreating aircraft "Stop him!"

Amber screamed into her COM: "Sinclair, close the warehouse window now!"

The transparent window began to slide into place again, and Kevin realized that he had to leave the warehouse now if he was going to at all. But then he noticed Travis running for the Falcon. The Purple got right under it, jumped, and just barely managed to grasp the rim of the door to the passenger's compartment. He began to pull himself up...but was suddenly jerked to a stop. The Purple looked down, and noticed a robotic hand curled around his left leg. Beyond it, Inez's visor stared back at him, the carved skull grinning at him horribly. A small flick of her wrist, and the Purple was tossed like a ragdoll off of the Falcon and onto the ground.

The Purple struggled against Inez's iron grip to get back to the Falcon, but saw that it was already turning to leave.

"Ah, shit! Come back!" Travis shouted after Kevin.

By now, the transparent window had slid half of the way back in place. A few more seconds, and the Falcon would not have enough room to leave through.

"I can't!" Kevin called back. "It's too late!"

"A matter of trust!" Travis shouted back. "We're in this together!"

"I'm sorry!" was all Kevin could think of to say. The window was two thirds of the way in place. It was now or never. He maneuvered the Falcon through the last remaining gap left, the aircraft banging slightly against the approaching window edge as he did so, scraping sparks from the rotors…and then the Falcon was through. Just barely through, but through.

Silence filled the warehouse. Travis made a small whimpering noise, but Inez smashed his face into the floor and he blacked out. Lemon Squadron stared at the retreating VTOL, which they could see through the warehouse door as it finally finished closing and locked in place with a _clang_.

"Okay, SITREP..." Hester groaned, levering herself off the floor. She'd fallen on Heart's sniper rifle, and the barrel had knocked the wind out of her.

"A Green hijacked the Falcon!" Hearts exclaimed. Then, to himself, he noted, "I can't believe that actually just happened."

"And he escaped with it. That stupid fucker stole _my_ Falcon from under me and escaped with it!" Patton roared, giving a two-finger salute to the air in anger.

" _Escaped_ is not the best word to use," Inez said through gritted teeth, a tone that made her already stone cold way of talking even more threatening. "Because we know where he's going."

* * *

The Yellow's Falcon landing outside of their base was the last thing the Greens were expecting to see the instant they emerged from the COM tower, having just come back through the teleporter from Centerpoint City. Without hesitation, they surrounded the Falcon cautiously, weapons drawn. The passenger compartment was empty. In fact, only the cockpit actually had anyone in it. And that person wasn't even Yellow; he was Green. The soldier hopped out as soon as the aircraft touched the ground. Mr. Boom seemed to recognize the soldier the instant he laid visor on him, approaching the soldier welcomingly. The same was not true for the other Greens, however.

"Who are you?" Nome asked the soldier, while adjusting his grip on his magnum.

"Hi, I'm Kevin Guinness," the solider replied. "I used to be one of your replacements, but due to certain…complicated circumstances…I had to leave the base for something. Then I got captured by the Yellows. And just now I escaped…on their Falcon." He shrugged his shoulders. "Like I said, it's complicated."

Nome nodded. "Yes. Last we spoke with them, the Yellows did mention that they had captured one of our replacements. And furthermore, Mr. Boom seems to have recognized you. Welcome to Green Base 18-Alpha, friend."

"You took their Falcon?" Kenny asked Kevin. "That's awesome! Now I have something to mess around with!"

"Although it's definitely interesting that you just escaped from the Yellows, given our new mission," Skope commented.

"Huh?" Kevin asked. "New mission? What do you mean?"

Jess sighed as she decided to be the one to explain, and take that task from Nome for once. "You see, we just got assigned a mission from the Grand General himself."

Kevin crossed his arms. " _The_ Grand General? Seriously?"

"Yes," Jess continued. "Recently, we've learned that the Reds...I assume you know of them?"

Kevin nodded. Jess continued.

"Well, they've grown extremely powerful through a private war with two other armies, the Oranges and Purples-"

"I heard about that." Kevin interrupted again. "The Yellows had a Purple as a prisoner as well. He helped me escape but...they caught him again."

"Right." Jess muttered, a little put off by Kevin's interruption. "Anyway, the Reds have been fighting on the other side of the planet with the other two armies. And now that they've grown strong enough, the Reds are going to attack Yellow Command."

"Okay," said Kevin, taking in everything he didn't already know. "So what does that have to do with us? Isn't that technically a _good_ thing that they're attacking the Yellows?"

"The Grand General has decided that the Red Army should be treated as a common enemy between the other armies if possible. Our mission is to discuss this with the Yellows here, and then, if all goes as planned, to help them defend Yellow Command from the Reds when they attack. Long story short, our upcoming destination is Yellow Command."

Kevin released his arms from their crossed position as he realized where the subject had gone. "Oh…FUCK!"


	30. THE GRAND GENERAL'S MISSION

The armory was a noisy place as the four members of Lemon Squadron reloaded and then got additional ammo for all the weapons they planned to take with them as they went after the Green prisoner who had somehow managed to escape with their Falcon. Patton swiftly accumulated as many shotgun shells as he could find and then clipped them first to the external holders on his wrist and chest and then his ammo belt, before doing the same with mags for an MA37 Assault Rifle, which would serve as his secondary weapon, should he run out of ammo for Lucy. Which seemed unlikely given how much ammo for her he was already carrying.

 _I'm gonna blow that stupid Green into a bloody pulp the instant I lay visor on him._ He thought to himself. Around him, Lemon did the same, practically overloading themselves with ammunition for their preferred weaponry. No such kill as overkill, after all.

Lemon was interrupted by their COMs. It was Sinclair, who was still in the security monitoring room.

"Uh, boss, I think you'd better get outside," she said, voice full of confusion.

"Why?" asked Patton, stopping in his vacuum cleaner-like collection of ammo for a moment. The rest of the team did the same, all listening to the conversation. "Are the Greens leaving their base already?"

"Um, yes, but…they've come here. They're in our Falcon, right outside the canyon entrance structure. The medic's on an open COM channel. They say they're giving it back as a token of respect, and that they want to talk."

"What?" Patton asked in disbelief. "Come again?"

Sinclair repeated what she had said the first time.

Patton stood straight up, as did the other three members of Lemon Squadron. " _What the flaming fuck?_ "

"I'm thinking the exact same thing, boss." Clair replied.

Patton rushed to the canyon base entrance. As soon as he stepped outside, he could indeed see his Falcon, being piloted this time by Nome. In its passenger compartment sat Skope, Kenny, Jess, Mr. Boom, and last but not least, the _shit fucking_ prisoner who had stolen the Falcon in the first place, Kevin Guinness.

The base door opened, and the rest of Lemon Squadron came out behind Patton, weapons armed and ready. The Yellow Commander took out Lucy and held it threateningly at the VTOL, though there wasn't really a point. Nome set the Falcon down in front of the Yellow's base.

"You stole my Falcon, but now you've brought it back." He shouted to Greens. "What is this supposed to look like, an apology?"

"Of sorts," Nome replied as he climbed out of the cockpit.

"Why?" All members of Lemon now had their weapons trained on Nome.

"Because we have reason to fight alongside you. As allies."

Patton laughed. "Oh really? I don't know if you remember, but the truce we had ended at Red Base, after you went into that weird alternate universe."

"You require another truce with us," Nome insisted. "You see, in a very short time, the Red Army will launch an attack on your Central Command. We have been given the mission to assist you in its defense, a task given to us by the leader of my Army, the Grand General himself."

"And in order to make peace, you're giving us back our Falcon?"

Nome nodded. "Exactly."

"Then why are you still in it?"

Nome looked back at the Falcon, to find that the rest of his team was still in the passenger's compartment. The medic motioned, and they all hastily piled out. Nome turned back to Patton. "We also apologize for the act of stealing your Falcon in the first place. You should know that Private Guinness was acting without our knowledge, being in your base at the time."

Patton started to say something in reply, but Hester cut him off.

"So, how do you know that our Command is about to be attacked?" she asked forcefully. To back up her statement, she hefted the Grenade Launcher she'd borrowed from Ryan. "Where did you get this information?"

Nome replied: "We recently defended our own Command from the Orange Army. After their defeat, we analyzed their computer system and discovered some logs they had kept of Red activity. The Oranges know what the Reds know."

"So where is Yellow Command, then?" Hester persisted. "If you know it's about to be attacked, then surely you know its latitude and longitude."

"That is a trick question," Nome explained pleasantly, obviously glad to have a chance to show off his knowledge. "Your Command is actually a space station with an orbital radius of 16.79 megameters from the planet's center of mass, and an orbital period of exactly six hours. Its orbital path relative to the planet's surface lies along the equator."

"Shit, they really do know where our Command is!" Hearts exclaimed. "Oh man this is bad!"

"I can assure you, this information is quite safe with us," Nome said reassuringly. "Knowing the information it does, my army could launch an attack on your Command itself without hesitation. Yet instead we have decided to help you defend it from an even more powerful adversary, the Red Army, who we both need to be treating as a common enemy if we are to survive to fight each other in the future."

Patton turned to Hester, a soldier looking to his superior for orders. "What do you think we should do?" He asked over Lemon's encrypted COM.

"What they're telling us must be true, since they do know the location of Command," said Hester. "But if they are correct, the implications of that are very unsettling, because that suggests that Command really is about to be attacked."

"But what if they're bluffing about the attack?" Patton asked. "What if they're trying to use us to gain access, and as soon as they get on Command, the rest of the Green Army locks onto their armor's COM signature, and they all teleport in to attack? Their fight against the Oranges probably is true, but the Red attack on Command doesn't have to be. It could just be a rouse for us to let them on."

"They gave us back our Falcon though, Pinkie," Hearts put in. "And they'd have to be fucking _insane_ to actually try attacking Command. Since the Brown mercenaries showed up, The Commander General's had that place secured tighter then a spider web of steel cables. That, and we left half the team up there. If anything happens, Deryn and her crew can handle it."

"But the same is also true for the Reds, or any other Army," added Hester. "Even if the Reds know where Command is, they'd have to be nuts to think they can take it."

"Although that one guy, Steve, seemed to be telekinetic," stated Patton. "When he escaped from the station, he caused a lot of damage. I'm not sure what affect a few dozen of him might have."

"Well I'm not buying it," said Hester. "Patton, your team beat the Reds once before, and on their own territory no less. If they can't even defend one of their own bases from us, I see no reason why they'd think they can take Command from us."

Patton nodded. "Good point." He turned to the Greens and called out: "After much thoughtful deliberation, we have carefully decided that you're all bullshitting us."

Nome seemed taken aback. "You do not believe us? But why?"

"The Reds are not powerful enough to take our Command, and you know it," said Patton. "And, for that matter, neither are you."

"You are making a terrible mistake," Nome insisted. "I realize that what we are telling you may seem unlikely, but we have given you the evidence to prove it. We know the location of your Command, so do the Oranges, and so do the Reds. Even if the Reds do not attack, how long now do you really think it will be before it does come under siege? At this point, the only army that does not know your Command's location, aside from the elusive Purples, is the Blue Army, and they are only ignorant of it because they are, well, Blues."

Hester crossed her arms in front on her chest plate. "If you're trying to suggest that we should hire you all as station guards, think again. Just how gullible to you honestly think we are? We're not letting you on our station, and that is our final decision. You wanna get on it, you can go the hard way."

Patton cocked Lucy for dramatic effect. "We thank you for returning our Falcon. As proof of our appreciation, we will let the Green who stole it go…for now."

Kevin let out a sigh of relief. _I'm so glad I don't have to go to Yellow Command,_ he thought silently to himself. _We tried to get in, and the Yellow's said no. And you said to help protect their command, not attack it. Sorry Grand General, we did the best we could. Mission over. I'm free of the Yellows, I've found a competent team, and now all is well._

He sighed contentedly.

Without warning, Patton's COM suddenly went off, a call of the highest priority. There was only one person who had that clearance. Patton put it on speaker. "Bro, what's going on?"

"Holy shit, bro!" came a panicked response. A roar of automatic gun fire could be heard in the background of the transmission, combined with several thundering booms that could only be a set of things exploding. "Command's under attack! Several dozen Reds just teleported onto the station. And they have telekinesis! They're ripping right through our defenses!"

Everyone uttered shocked replies. The Yellow's motions reflected their surprise that the Greens were right, and the Green's motions reflected their surprise that they really _were_ right.

"Roger that! What do you need?"

"Reinforcements would be nice!" Bradley continued. "Round up anyone you can get together and get them up here. Your team, Lemon, even that Blue. We need all the help we can get!"

"Copy that, bro!" Patton replied. "We'll be there ASAP! Leave some Reds for us!" He then switched his COM to a different frequency. "Stone, Hobar, Sinclair, and former Blue, get out here NOW! Yellow Command is under siege by the Reds. Drop whatever the hell it is you're in the middle of doing and MOVE! Especially you, Hobar. I swear, if you're doing a _Star Wars: The Clone Wars_ marathon again-"

Hearts put a hand on Patton's shoulder. "I'm sure they get it, Pinkie. They'll be here."

To the Greens, Hester said: "Looks like you guys were right after all." She then let out a long, loud sigh. "All right, since everything you've said so far is true, and we need as much help defending as we can get, I don't really see any choice but to let you come with us."

Kenny whooped, Nome nodded satisfactorily, and Kevin let out a groan.

"Looks like you get your way this time, medic," Patton said to Nome. "How is it that I always seem to end up fighting with you instead of killing you? Just don't count on this lasting. Hell, technically speaking, we'd still be enemies if your Grand General What's His Face hadn't come up with this impeccably timed 'common enemy' idea about us and the Reds. Let me make this clear; first chance I get…" He yanked the slide on Lucy again.

Nome nodded. "I understand. But just because we are Green and you are Yellow, do not think for a moment that we will not do whatever it takes to keep your Command from falling. The Grand General's will is the will of the Green Army, which means that this mission is the will of the Green Army. And that is why we will not, why we _cannot_ , fail in this task. In service to the Grand General's mission, we will fight with you to the bitter end, if that be what is necessary."

"Glad to hear it. Now arm up! We have Reds to kill!"


	31. ATTACK OF THE REDS

The view of X-B-O-X-L-1-V was an impressive sight when gazed upon through the entrance bay force field on the planet facing side of Yellow Command, and Bradley Patton would loved to have looked at it as he normally did. However, not he or anyone else could really watch it at the moment, for the air inside the bay was filled with a blizzard of bullets and flying objects. In just the few moments since the Reds had somehow managed to infiltrate the station through their teleporter, everything had descended into complete chaos, and the Lord High Commander General was being given what could easily be considered the toughest challenge yet in his life. Not only were the Reds savvy gunfighters, but somehow their squad leaders had developed some kind of telekinesis ability as well. Just like that Steve guy they'd had on the station a day earlier. In addition to the constant fire from the Red's weapons, the defending Yellow soldiers also had to be weary of large massive objects that would suddenly gain terrifying amounts of momentum. Due to these powers, the Reds had managed to push the Yellows back considerably.

Things did not look good for the Yellow's defense. The Reds had managed to occupy the space where the entrance teleporters were. Not only did this give the Reds the advantage of being able to protect their Army's new arrivals, it also meant that Yellow reinforcements would have a hell of a time getting in. Reinforcements that, Bradley hated to admit to himself, he really was going to need. The enemy was making solid gains towards the control room and the bridge, which would prove disastrous losses if taken.

For the moment though, the Yellow defenders had managed to stop the Reds at a cross junction of paths a relatively good distance from the command center. The width of the junction forced the Reds into tight formation, making them easier to cut down. It also helped that three of the soldiers fighting back were the second half of Lemon Squadron, left behind on the station by Hester for pretty much this exact reason. But the Reds were still advancing, slowly gaining ground through sheer numbers and the occasional giant flying object.

From his position of cover behind a make-shift barricade, Bradley shouted out orders, verbally and digitally through his COM, as quickly as he could physically get them out. Though there wouldn't be anyone to follow them if help didn't get here soon...

As if on cue with Bradley's thoughts, the teleporter near the force field suddenly flared, and out of it erupted a series of soldiers in yellow armor. On their shoulder pads, they bore the familiar cross symbol that Bradley recognized immediately: Lemon Squadron.

The Reds turned to face their new adversaries. Lemon Squadron tensed. From behind the Reds, a large object rose from the ground.

Lemon ducked, almost in unison, as metal rebar flew through the air towards them. Hester smashed her fist to the ground, and from her armored gauntlet exploded a hexagonally paneled transparent shield, which hastily formed a glowing, humming dome over the members of Lemon. The rebar smashed into the bubble and stopped dead, then splintered into many smaller pieces as the force of the impact shattered it. Debris fell around the perimeter of the drop shield.

"Holy shit, these bastards really do have telekinesis!" Hearts shouted, her voice echoing inside the shield. "This could be a hell of a fight."

"Good thing we brought the drop shield." Inez noted calmly. "Let's see them get us now.

"How much longer does this thing last?" Patton asked Hester.

She nodded. "For about fifteen more seconds. Let's make 'em count."

Patton activated his COM. "Sinclair, the drop shield is in place. Send everyone through now! We've only got fifteen seconds!"

The teleporter brightened again, and the rest of Lemon's allies began coming through. Bradley watched from his place of cover as the rest of the reinforcements came onto the station. From the teleporter stepped Captain Sinclair, then Private Hobar, then Private Stone, then Brian the former Blue, and then…a Green? Followed by another Green. This first Green was followed by three more. Finally the teleporter deactivated again, and though Bradley was impressed with the personnel Lemon had managed to bring with them, he was forced to wonder exactly what strings they had had to pull to convince Greens to fight with them. But he could complain about it later. For now, he needed all the help he could get.

He saluted at his brother. From underneath the drop shield, Patton returned it.

"T-minus 5 seconds to shield shutdown," Hester reported to everyone else. "If you're not ready, then get ready."

"Bring it on." Patton growled, gripping his shotgun.

The shield fell away, and everyone was ready. Greens, Yellows, and Reds.

All hell broke loose.

Ryan shouldered his rocket launcher and loosed both his rockets within the first second. Hearts, Amber, and Skope all began firing the sniper rifles point blank, not even bothering to look through their scopes. Their reply was a wall of bullets and flying metal pieces from the station walls. Despite their attempt at an opening offensive, the Greens and Yellows were forced to jump to cover, still returning fire.

This was Bradley's chance. Now that the Reds in the corridor were distracted by Lemon and the other reinforcements, the Lord High Commander General could flank them. He gave the motion, and his men opened fire. The Reds attempted to find cover, but they were not as fortunate as the Greens or Yellows, for nearly all of the cover items they had started with had been flung across the corridor via their telekinesis ability. Taking the initiative, Bradley and his men raced into battle, shouting and shooting down the corridor. With no other alternative, the Reds raced for the teleporters, giving ground to the Yellows. Patton's group saw their own opening and shifted their fire once more, catching the Reds in a deadly crossfire. Several fell, but the majority of them managed to get to the teleporter. The last of them vanished just as Bradley's men reached their location.

The Yellows and Greens cautiously inched out of cover, fingers still on triggers. When they noticed Bradley, they relaxed. Lemon snapped salutes.

"Alright, sir?" Hester asked Bradley as he approached.

"For now," the Lord High Commander General reported. "But they're not done, I'm sure. They've almost certainly teleported to another part of this station."

"We'll deal with them later. One victory at a time, bro, just like we always do," said Patton.

The two brothers arm hugged. The rest of the group busied themselves reloading their weapons, and Bradley's team set about treating their wounded and moving the dead Reds out of the way.

"Long time no see, right?" Patton joked good-naturedly.

"Yeah. It's been, what, a couple of days, at most?" Bradley asked in reply. "Don't happen to have another prisoner with you, do you?"

"We do actually," Patton laughed. "Well, not _with_ us. He's back at base. We all had to run when you called, and couldn't take him along. Obviously, really. But I'll drag him up here as soon as things cool down."

Bradley nodded, then turned to everyone else. "Lemon, sure as hell good to see you guys. And what in the fuck are _Greens_ doing here?"

Hester shrugged. "Its...complicated, sir. I'll just say they didn't expect to end up here either, and leave it at that for now."

"Mind if we discuss it after the battle?" Patton requested.

Bradley nodded again, at Patton. "Sure thing, bro."

A new Yellow jogged up to join the group, a girl. She bore armor similar to Patton's, and a DMR was clutched in her hands.

"Ma'am!" she called, saluting Hester. "Good to see you made it back in one piece!"

"Confirmed, Deryn." Hester acknowledged the soldier. "Where's the rest of the team?"

"Here!" Another female voice called out from down the hall. Two more Lemon soldiers came into view, the one on the right hauling a massive machine gun with him.

"Our replacements, I assume?" Patton asked quietly. Hester nodded.

"Lemon always has to be ready." She replied darkly. "But they're just as good as you guys were. This here's Lieutenant Deryn Natsworthy."

"Nice to meet you, sir." Deryn stuck out her hand, and Patton shook it. "I have to say, it's an honor to meet the man I stepped into the shoes of."

"So you're the new pilot, then." Patton noted. Deryn nodded. Hester jumped into the conversation again.

"And the other two are Sergeant Thomas Shaw, demolitions and heavy weapons-"

"Sir." Shaw noted, saluting quickly with one hand.

"And Sergeant Wren Sharp, electronics."

"Also her younger sister." Wren jumped in pleasantly, casually slinging her assault rifle over her shoulder. "She seems to forget that a lot." She explained, noting the confused silence of those around her.

Patton looked at Wren, then back at Hester. Even though both were wearing helmets, he could see a resemblance in their posture.

"I don't forget." Hester said coldly to Wren. "I just don't care."

Sensing a brewing argument from experience, Bradley indicated to the group to follow him. The group fell into step behind him. As he walked, he gave a quick SITREP.

"Okay everyone, here's the situation. The Reds have taken this station by storm, and have established somewhat of an outer perimeter on the circumference of the station, where the teleporters are located. We don't know how, but they can use them, and they're taking all the advantages out of this that they can get."

"Sounds like we need to shut 'em down." Patton muttered grimly. He cracked his knuckles.

"We should split our forces." Hester suggested. "We can fight more efficiently if we can hit them from two places at once."

"My thoughts exactly." Bradley noted. "General, I want you to lead one of these squads. Commander, you lead the other. Lieutenant Natsworthy and her squad will stay with me and hold the bridge against any surprise attacks."

"I'll take the port side of the station." Hester suggested.

"And I'll take the starboard." said Patton.

Sensing a separation of teams, Hester, Inez, and Hearts formed into one group, while Patton, Clair, Ryan, Amber, and Brian formed into another. Deryn, Shaw, and Wren moved out of the way behind Bradley.

"And what about the Greens?" Bradley asked, noticing the Greens hadn't moved.

"We'll split 'em," said Hester. "One group gets two Greens, the other gets three."

"Deal," said Patton. "I'll take the medic. I want to keep my eye on him."

"It will be an honor to fight with you again," complimented Nome as he walked over to Patton's side.

"I think we should take the weapons expert," Inez recommended to Hester. "Especially since Patton's group has Ryan."

Hester nodded. "We'll take him."

Kenny walked over to Hester's side. "Works for me." He noted. "I really don't care who I get to fight with, as long as I get to blow shit up! And boy do you guys blow shit up a lot!"

Hearts nodded. "Now that's an attitude I like!"

"We'll also take the sniper," Patton said. "Heart's is worth two snipers, we get two."

"Fine," said Skope. He regarded Amber for a moment as he came to stand alongside her, not forgetting that she was the one who sniped him in the ass not more than five days ago. The two turned away from each other, refusing to meet the other's visor.

Hester pointed at Kevin. "You're coming with us also, Green. Even though you're not technically our prisoner anymore, I don't want you to think you've escaped us completely."

"And I get to order you around again too." Inez added, not bothering to hide the glee in her voice.

"This sucks," Kevin grumbled as he glumly moved over to Hester's group.

"And I guess that leaves us with the communications expert," said Patton.

Jess looked up from her iPod. It took her a moment to put the pieces together that the Yellows were picking teams, having been distracted when they started doing it. "I can't _believe_ the Grand General wants us to do this," she grumbled, putting her iPod away as she joined Patton and the rest of his group. She crossed her arms.

Of course, one member of the Greens was missing, not that the Yellow's knew it; the Greens could not use Master Chief in this battle, as they had for Operation Downbelow. The Grand General had decided it should stay in Centerpoint City under "safe keeping" because he believed, perhaps rightly so, that it would be far worse for the Yellows to get their hands on Master Chief and use it for themselves then it would be for the Greens to fail in Yellow Command's defense. Master Chief was deemed simply too powerful to be sent on a joint operation where the alliance was on such shaky terms, as was that between the Greens and Yellows. Not to mention that the orb could use its abilities to help repair Centerpoint City.

Bradley looked at all of them. "Well, it seems to me that you're all set. Get moving, and good luck to you. Something tells me you'll need it before this is over."

"We don't need luck." Hester noted.

"We make our own." Patton finished.

The two groups saluted (with the exception of the Greens) and turned to head off to their respective parts of the station.

* * *

Patton, Amber, Clair, Ryan, Brian, Nome, Jess, and Skope raced through the western corridors of the station. More Yellow soldiers fell into step behind them, having also been called to defend this part of the station. All weapons at the ready, they paused at the door to the starboard part of the station.

Patton held up his fist, waiting to see if they could discern anything from the other side. No sound came through, so, with a battle cry of "who wants lemonade?" he kicked the door open.

On the other side waited a horrifying sight.

The Greens recognized the teleporter array instantly, though the Yellows took a moment to realize exactly what they were looking at. A five by five grid of teleporter terminals sat in the center of the large hallway. And spawning from them were Reds. Dozens of Reds.

"That's some reinforcements," Amber commented in partial shock. "LOTS of reinforcements."

"The enemy has established a base on the station," Nome mumbled aloud to himself. "This situation is far worse than I could ever have anticipated."

"Well then, let's make it better, shall we?" Patton proposed while inserting a round into Lucy and yanked the slide.

"Sure thing, boss," Ryan said while replacing the assault rifle he had been holding with his reloaded rocket launcher, which he mounted with trained balance upon his shoulder.

The Reds in the chamber had noticed the Greens and Yellows by this point, and had pulled out their own weapons.

Without countdown, the Greens and Yellows charged, their unified battle cry rebounding throughout the room.


	32. THE BATTLE OF YELLOW COMMAND

The chamber became a mass of Red, Yellow, and Green soldiers molding together in a violent clash. The battle was intensified even further by a few more Red soldiers who popped into the room via the teleporter array to reinforced their fellows. From somewhere in the Green/Yellow side of the group, a grenade bounced into the teleporter array and went off. The explosion chained through the web, and sent the right half of the array flying everywhere. The array shut off.

"The arrays are really that fragile?" Patton shouted to his team above the clamor. "Holy shit, maybe these guys are weaker then they make themselves up to be!"

"Yeah, we found out the arrays are really fragile," Skope yelled over to Patton while blocking a Red's melee attack by putting up his arms. "We discovered that the explosive way, which involved a Falcon and a tank."

"They can send vehicles through these things?" Patton exclaimed. "Shit! Good thing we took it out. I'd rather not face a Warthog in close quarters."

"We deactivated this one," Nome corrected as he double headshotted two Reds with one pistol round. "I have little doubt, however, that the Reds have several more of these through which they may still gain reinforcements."

"One victory at a time," Patton shouted back. "We'll deal with those ones in time. Lets just clean up the mess here."

All of a sudden the battle was interrupted by a loud rhythmic banging noise that made everyone not prepared for it jump out of surprise, despite how loud it already was in the room. "Rapid fire sniper rifle!" Skope shouted. "Hit the deck!"

Everyone hit the floor, including the Reds, who did it more orderly and had clearly been trained to expect this situation. The person left standing was holding a bulky looking version of an SRS99C-S2 AM non-scoped sniper rifle, except that the weapon's receiver connected to a chain of .21 caliber bullets which wove around the Red's shoulders and belt like a chaingun. The weapon itself was firing the rounds like a machine gun. It was essentially an automatic sniper rifle.

Amber's response was to pull out her own sniper rifle and fire off all four shots of her gun's clip at the Red. Because she was firing from the hip to get the bullets out as fast as possible, her shots were mostly wide, with only one actually hitting her target, on his left shoulder. However, the Red merely stumbled at bit, proving the extent to which he was armored. Amber tried to reload to get off more shots, but instead was forced to duck as the stream of .21 caliber bullets zinged by above her and gouged out holes in the metal behind her.

Now that the Red was in Amber's direction, Ryan took his turn to spring up. He'd pulled out the plasma launcher he'd used to interrogate the Purple, except that this time he had it set for maximum charge, "lethally lethal" as this setting was often called. The Red heard the plasma launcher begin to charge up, and turned to face Ryan. Ryan let a plasma grenade off…

And it landed directly on the end of the barrel of the Red's sniper rifle. The Red did notice this as he charged up the automatic sniper rifle, but not in time. The rifle fired, and in the next instant he was replaced by an explosion of plasma and bullets from the rifle, which went everywhere under influence from the rifle's propulsion system and the outward force of the grenade, shredding all Reds nearest where the heavy weapons soldier had been standing. This was followed by a short rain of red chunks that landed on everyone in the room, which the Yellows and Greens decided to convince themselves was red colored only because of the armor color of the newly deceased soldiers. Though Ryan commented "it's like a level of Gears of War in here!" to himself.

This time, the Yellows and Greens were prepared, while the Reds were still unsure of exactly what had just happened to their heavy weapons expert and everyone around him. The Greens and Yellows shot up from the ground and thrust out their weapons like bandits in a bank robbery.

"Everyone Red will remain on the ground if they wish to live," Patton shouted out. "Good job, Hobar," he also said to Ryan.

Ryan nodded back at Patton, relishing in the moment, because of how rare it was for his boss to compliment him on anything.

"Your array has been destroyed, so there is little point in attempting to escape," Nome stated to the Reds.

Patton motioned, and several Yellow soldiers began tying up the hands of the surviving Red soldiers behind their backs.

"That was a good fight," Clair sighed.

"Indeed it was, a most close and decisive victory," said an unlikely voice for such a statement. Everyone turned to find Brian walking nonchalantly across the room while talking in a low voice very much unlike his normal one. "The Reds did not anticipate such a victory, for us, I mean, and the dominant probability is that we will prevail if we just keep…" He stopped talking for a moment while he tried to figure out how to continue the sentence.

"Um, is he on something?" Amber asked.

"I think he's just really happy over winning this battle," said Clair. "At least, that's my guess."

"And showing it by pantomiming Nome," Jess snickered.

"Nice choice." Patton muttered.

Brian continued walking until he reached a keypad by the windows which he must have believed opened a door somewhere. He leaned on it to seem casual, but instead of a door opening to a corridor as he had planned, the doors of an OLAV pod instead closed around him before he knew what was happening. Then the pod's engines fired, and the pod shot out from the station into outer space.

"Oops," said Kenny, voicing everyone else's thoughts aloud.

"Please tell me that pod has a destination," Clair requested no one in particular.

"OLAV's aren't meant to be launched blind. If there's no coordinates, it just goes along whatever trajectory it happens to be on when it fires," said Patton. "The launch thrust isn't enough to make it reach escape velocity, but it'll be enough to keep him stuck in orbit."

"So…what happens to him now?" Amber asked quietly.

"Either he stays in orbit, or falls into the planet. He's either shocked for life at landfall, or just…stuck until he runs out of air. Sorry." Patton shrugged his shoulders.

Everyone took a moment of silence for their potentially lost comrade.

"We will always remember him for how funny and stupid he was," said Ryan.

The Yellow's COMs buzzed. It was Bradley. "How goes taking back our Army's heart and soul from these assholes?" he asked.

"Hey, bro. We just finished clearing out this sector of the station," said Patton. "Those Reds had some kind of teleporter array which they somehow got on the station, and were using to bring in reinforcements. But don't worry, we took care of it."

"That's good," said Bradley. "Here's a bit of a head's up on the rest of the station: your team and Lemon have turned the tide, at least a bit; the Reds are getting a run for their money, so to speak, and we've taken back a bit of the station that was lost. But just now I've received a report from the other two Greens and the rest of Lemon, and things don't sound too good where they are."

"They've encountered trouble?" Patton asked.

Bradley elaborated: "Well, just a minute ago, Hamilton, or Hearts, as I think you know him better, screamed in his mike something about a trap, and going "straight down a shit waterfall at this point in the fight". I'm not sure if the second part is code for anything, but whatever the case it sure as hell doesn't sound good. I want you over there to help them ASAP."

Patton nodded reflexively, even though he knew his brother couldn't see it over the COM. "Sure thing, bro. We'll be down there five minutes ago." He turned off his COM.

"We need to move." He said. His team nodded.

Feeling in a confident mood from having created a spectacular finale to the most recent battle, Ryan was already at the door leading in the direction they needed to go. He gave the door's keypad a second look to make absolute sure he didn't make Brian's mistake, then opened the door. With that, the seven of them began jogging to the other end of the station.

Yellow soldiers scurried all over the place like large mice as the Yellows and Greens rushed past. While things on the station still seemed very chaotic, they now didn't seem as frantic as they had, a sign of hope that the Reds really could be driven from the station. Finally they came upon the door leading to the chamber that the rest of Lemon, as well as Kenny and Jess, had been known to enter.

The door hissed open, and single filed everyone stepped inside. The room was pitch black. The Yellows and Greens groped around in the dark, trying to see what they were walking into. Skope activated the IR filter in his helmet, but this had little effect on his visibility, for it was as though something was obscuring all parts of his surroundings more than five meters away; he could only make out his team and the Yellows, nothing else except for the far array of windows looking out upon the vacuum of space on the other end of the room, which were the only things emitting visible or infrared light that he could see.

"I really don't like this, boss," Amber whispered to Patton. "Enemies are supposed to be here, and we can't see. Everything is wrong about this situation."

"I believe what Hearts said about a trap may be correct." Nome postulated.

"Hester?" Patton shouted into the room. "Hearts? Inez? Anyone?" Silence was the only thing that returned his summons.

Then a loud click resounded throughout the room. "Oh, shit," Ryan whispered. "I think I just stepped on something."

The room burst with light from overhead, and around the Greens and Yellows suddenly appeared a cage of shield walls, entrapping all seven of them in a near cubic rectangle of transparent orange surface. Standing on the other side of the walls were Reds soldiers. The Greens and Yellows looked around with shock and surprise. The Reds stepped in even closer to their catch. One Red they all recognized in particular.

"We meet again!" Steve shouted at them through the shield wall. "You assholes who destroyed my base! Well, now I get to return the favor."

Patton fired on the shield wall with Lucy, though it had no discernible effect. "Goddam Reds. What did you do with Lemon?"

Steve crossed his arms. "Lemon? Oh, nothing much." He motioned to the other side of the room, where another cage held the subject of Patton's question. The rest of Lemon, as well as Jess and Kenny, were inside of it, pounding on the shield walls. "We have the sound insulators activated on it, so that they could watch you share their fate without the possibility of them warning you," Steve continued. "Though I don't suppose that is necessary now. I'd rather listen to them beg." He hit something on his tacpad, and in the next second Lemon's shouting from inside their cage became audible.

"Let us out of here, you bastards!" Kenny shouted at them. "I swear I'll torch you with a flamethrower if you don't!"

Steve and the other Reds laughed with amusement. "You know," said Steve to Patton. "This idea for surrounding your enemies with shield walls, it does sound familiar to you, doesn't it?"

All Yellows stopped pounding in the shield walls and started listening.

Steve elaborated: "The most interesting thing about this trap is not that it worked. Well, I suppose it's _almost_ the most interesting thing."

"Explain," Patton demanded.

Steve laughed again, and the other Reds in the room laughed as well. "The most interesting thing about this trap is that we got the idea for it from someone we captured from your base."

Patton sucked in a breath. "What?"

Steve put his hands together and thought to himself out loud. "Well, he was your prisoner, and now he's ours. But let me backtrack; do you know what my favorite time of battle is?"

The Yellows just stared back at him, while the Greens listened with intrigue.

"My favorite time of battle is when my enemy is attacking someplace else, so that I can infiltrate their base when no one is home."

The Yellows unanimously took in short breaths of gasps as their worst fears were confirmed.

"Son of a bitch...Patton was right." Clair muttered to herself, referencing her CO's earlier paranoia about a Red attack against their base.

"I told you that when I activated the beacon at my base, it meant we'd be attacking the Wilderness," Steve continued. "But I left out the part about our plans to attack the Wilderness _and_ your Command Center simultaneously!" He laughed a third time, and the other Reds in the room followed with a cruel chorus of cheers.

"And that's not the best part!" Steve stated after things quieted a bit. "The best part is that I've set up these cages exactly as the Purple described them when he told us about his interrogation." He pointed at the ceiling of the cage.

The Greens and Yellows followed his finger's line, and found the noses of plasma launchers staring back at them. "Oh, fuck!" Kenny exclaimed from Lemon's cage. "There're launchers on our ceiling too!"

"And don't think for a moment that these are set to their interrogation setting!" Steve exclaimed. "These are at maximum, because when we watch you die, we want to see bits! Ahahahahaha!"

"You won't remain on this station for very much longer," Hester grumbled at Steve. "Last I saw out there, we were driving you back."

"And the reason it appeared that way is because I wanted all soldiers under my command to watch your demise," Steve countered. He waved with his hand, and dozens more Red soldiers walked into the room from outside corridors. "Everyone under my command is here now. Here to watch you die. Well, almost everyone."

"The entire remaining Red attack force is here to watch us," said Ryan. "I really hope this doesn't end up on YellowTube."

But Patton detected a hint of glee in his voice. His suspicion was confirmed moments later when Ryan TEXT-COM'd a message over: THIS GUYS DUMB AS A DROID. PLAMA LAUNCHER ROUNDS ONLY BOUNCE ON LOWER SETTINGS. THOSE THINGS GO OFF, AND THEY'LL STICK TO THE WALLS AND FREE US.

JUST PLAY ALONG FOR THE MOMENT. Patton sent back. WE MIGHT LEARN SOMETHING . BUT WHEN HE FIRES, GET READY TO MOVE.

"You said 'almost everyone'", said Nome to Steve, not having received Ryan's message. "Who is the remainder?"

Steve clapped his hands together. "Why, I'm so glad you asked that question. I've been waiting to get to this. You see, the 'remainder' as you like to call it, was strategically inserted into this station's bridge, waiting until the opportune moment to take control of it."

"What?" the Yellows exclaimed, while the Greens just gasped.

"I doubt the soldiers holding the bridge had any idea that the leader and instigator of my army was waiting there the whole time."

"The Architect is here?" Hearts exclaimed.

"And he's taken the bridge?" Patton shouted in disbelief.

Steve nodded. "So just in case you were hoping that all the Reds being here instead of fighting would take from my army's victory over you, think again. This battle is over, and no more fighting is even necessary. Here is proof." He hit a button on his tacpad, and said into it: "My lord, the prisoners are ready to hear their commander beg. Put him on."

Through Steve's tacpad, the Yellows and Greens could clearly hear Bradley's strained voice. "Bro, I assume you can hear this. Listen; YOU HAVE TO GET OUT OF HERE. Get off the station and initiate Code FIREFALL. We're in deep shit. The Architect and some elite Reds have taken the bridge and captured me and Deryn's group. Repeat, the bridge is taken. And the Architect is here, but it's really something else, not what I expected at all-"

Steve cut off the transmission. "Well, I think that's enough." He didn't particularly sound happy with what had come through.

"I'll get out of here," Patton shouted at the Reds. "And if you so much as _touch_ my brother, I'm going to kill every single last one of you! Do you hear me?" He reloaded a shell into Lucy and cocked her to punctuate his point.

"I won't just touch you and your brother," Steve sneered verbally. "I'll turn you both into bits." He pointed at the plasma launchers on the ceilings of both cages. "It's about time for all of you to dance, I think. Dance and then die in glorious explosions. We've done enough talking. Unless you want to beg or pray." He raised his hand to his tacpad, preparing to press on it the button that would (supposedly) ensure the Yellow's and Green's deaths.

"Suck a lime." Hester spat, an insult only known amongst Lemon Squadron.

 _This_ _is_ _it,_ Skope thought to himself.

" _I_ _don_ _'_ _t_ _even_ _get_ _to_ _listen_ _to_ _music_ _on_ _my_ _iPod_ _one_ _more_ _time,_ thought Jess. _What_ _a_ _shame._

 _Heh._ _Idiot,_ Ryan chuckled, unperturbed. _This_ _should_ _prove_ _interesting_ _…_

 _Three, two, one..._ Patton counted off.

Steve was leaning his hand down to press the KILL button on his tacpad when all of a sudden the window array on the far wall exploded inward. An OLAV pod crashed into the room, imbedding itself into the floor. Atmosphere whooshed out into space through the brand new hole in the wall, taking the surprised Red soldiers with it. The Yellows and Greens were actually fortunate at this point to be in their cages, because the very walls that held them prevented them from being sucked out into space along with their enemies.

Steve was now the last Red in the room, and he clung to a corner of Patton's cage. Eventually the force on him became too great, and the wall tore off, swinging 180 degrees and catching on its other side, which was still connected to the rest of the cage. Steve continued to cling to it for his life. With one wall missing, the pressure forces now had infiltrated the inside of the cage, though the Greens and Yellows in it were still mostly protected because they still had some shelter provided by the parts of the cage still standing.

Out of the cage Patton stuck his right arm, which held Lucy, and pointed her at Steve. "You attacked my base. You besieged this station. You tried to harm my brother."

Steve shook his head madly. "It was all my commander's idea, the one you know as the Architect. He came up with these plans. I was just the person who set them in motion. I mean, c'mon? When someone gets stabbed with a knife, who's really to blame? The knife itself, or the person wielding the knife?"

"Both," said Patton as he pulled the trigger.

Lucy's barrel was too far away from the Red to deal any actual damage to Steve in such low atmosphere, but the force of the blast was still enough to loosen his grip on the shield wall most of the way.

"Oh God oh God oh God…" He chanted, sounding almost on the verge of tears.

"Hey, when you get to hell..." Patton started.

As Steve looked up at Patton silently, Patton reoriented himself so that his feet were sticking out of the cage.

"Say hi to Lucy for me!"

With that, Patton slammed his boot into Steve's face.

The Red went sailing out into the vacuum of space screaming "Fuuuuuuuuuuuuuuck Youuuuuuuu!", flying off to join the rest of the Red attack force in orbital trajectory and mission failure.

"Original." Patton muttered.

About fifteen seconds later, the station's atmospheric conservation protocols kicked in, and a metal wall slid down to cover the hole. Then the atmospheric recycling systems kicked in, and the room was re-pressurized.

Patton rushed over to the cage containing Lemon Squadron, Jess, and Kenny, and hit the keypad on the wall that deactivated the shield walls. "You guys alright?"

"Yeah Pinkie, we're fine," Hearts replied.

Now everyone turned to face the OLAV pod. They could hear the sounds of someone pounding on the inside, struggling to get out but not knowing how. Hester walked over to the pod and hit the release lever. The pod opened to reveal Brian.

"What?" Hearts asked the former Blue. "How the hell did you get in there?"

"He accidentally launched himself off in it when we were at the other end of the station," Patton explained.

"Uh-huh," nodded Hearts. "But that still doesn't explain how he got back on the station."

Nome stepped forward. "I believe I have a theory which explains what has happened."

Everyone turned to face him. "Oh?" said Kenny.

Nome explained: "When Brian launched himself from the other side of the station, the pod's trajectory took it into planetary orbit. The pod then traveled in an ellipse all the way around the planet, and then, by a sheer fluke of probability, ended up right back where it began: on this station."

Patton thought the theory over silently for a second, gave a subtle nod at the fact that he could think of no better explanation, and then walked over to Brian, who was dazedly standing outside of the pod. "You are a lucky bastard," he said as he patted Brain on the shoulder. "A lucky, lucky bastard."

"So, what now, boss?" Ryan asked Patton.

"The Architect has taken the bridge," he replied. "Let's move."

* * *

The thirteen of them raced for the bridge. As they hurried, they could see more Yellow soldiers, but less chaotic scurrying. That meant Steve had been right; aside from the bridge, all of the Red attack force had been sucked out into space when Brian's OLAV pod returned to the station. The Yellows and Greens finally reached the bridge. Patton walked up to a soldier standing just outside the door. "What's the situation in there?"

"No idea, sir," the soldier replied. "All of a sudden this door locked, and we heard lots of commotion inside, like a battle or something."

"Any COM chatter?"

"Just one thing. A little burst transmission. "Barking spiders". No idea what it means."

"Shit." Hester swore. "That's a panic code."

"Who's?" Patton probed.

"Deryn's."

"Shit is right." Patton turned back to the solider. "Anything else?"

"No sir. It's completely silent now; can't even get COM signals to go through at this point." He motioned to a technician working beside him on the door's keypad. "We've nearly got it open, though. Just a few more seconds."

The Greens and Yellows readied their weapons. "This is it, people," said Hester. "This is where we take out the Architect."

"Oooh, yeah!" exclaimed Ryan as he slung his rocket launcher over his shoulder.

"Stand clear!" the tech at the door shouted.

The door flew open, and the thirteen of them rushed inside. But then they all stopped, because the scene in front of them made so little sense.


	33. THE ARCHITECT

The bridge of Yellow Command was always a wonderful sight to behold. In the center of the roughly circular room was a holotable which gave a wire-frame holographic representation of the entire station in all three of its dimensions, which was currently showing the damage done to it by the Red attack. Behind that was a walkway which curved around half of the room and led to the upper half of the bridge. But on nearly all sides of the room, windows looked outside, showing an intense panorama of scenery. Just outside the bridge could be seen the edge of the station, and in the background of that the planet XBOXL1V's surface could be seen at such an angle to its star that it reflected off if its atmosphere much of the light that hit it, shading the entire planet in a radiant bright orange glow as if it's surface were on fire. And amidst this beautiful sight, small asteroids became shooting stars as they cascaded into XBOXL1V's atmosphere, turning into bright blue beams that flowed down towards the planet.

None of this mattered at the moment to the Greens or Yellows, however. Because standing on the bridge's walkway was a figure who, by their very appearance, demanded answers. Though "standing" wasn't the most applicable term in it's case.

Levitating off of walkway's surface and hovering in the air was a fusion coil. A very angry looking fusion coil, if the bright red color of its containment shell was any indication.

The Greens and Yellows stared at the coil. Then things got weirder; the fusion coil spoke.

"So then, this is the best opposition the Green and Yellow Armies could muster, is it?" the fusion coil asked rhetorically, with a surprisingly soft voice. "You may think you've won, but you are spectacularly mistaken. Those you have defeated were merely pawns! I am the leader of the Reds, and in my presence you shall know this Army's true power! Ahahaha!"

Silence filled the bridge following the coil's pronouncement. None of the soldiers assembled were really quite ready to reply.

"Vincent?" Amber addressed the fusion coil finally. "What in the hell are you doing here?"

Everyone turned to stare at her.

"Whoa, _waiiiiiit_ a minute," said Ryan. "Are you saying you know this…" He pointed at Vincent.

Amber nodded. "Yeah, his name's Vincent. I first met him at Red Base. He's the coil I took back with me after that battle."

"So it IS the same one you had in your quarters!" Ryan muttered.

"Yeah. And, well...we talked about stuff. Politics and things. I had no idea he was the leader of the Reds. I swear on my life!"

Patton alternated focus quickly between Vincent and Amber, wondering if this was really happening, or if this was a shared hallucination and Amber was insane. He did get some answers when Brian spoke up.

"Oh my God!" the former Blue exclaimed while staring at Vincent. "Patton, look! That's the fusion coil I told you about that came into my room one night and talked to me!" He faced Patton and put his visor right in his boss's. "Now do you believe me? Do you?"

Patton grabbed the front of Brian's helmet and shoved him to the ground, and then stated: "The Blue was right this whole time. If there is a God of Atheism, I swear…"

He then straightened up and faced Amber again. "Stone, when I asked you about this fusion coil, you said it was to house a tape recorder."

Amber stiffly faced Patton. "So let me get this straight: You believed me when I told you that I put a tape recorder inside of a fusion coil because I was lonely and needed a better way of completing my routine audio logs. You _really_ bought that. _Really?_ "

"It's a common tactic." Patton replied. "I did the same thing when I was back in Lemon, except I used a stuffed dolphin." He turned his attention back to the coil. "We'll discuss this later. We have more important things to deal with."

Meanwhile, the Greens had been staring in blatant confusion at Vincent and the Yellows. "Hey guys?" Kenny exclaimed at the Yellows. "Could someone tell me just that the flying fuck is going on? Why is there a levitating fusion coil that talks? Why does said fusion coil claim to be the leader of the Red Army? And weirdest of all, why do some of _you_ appear to be familiar with said floating talking army-leading fusion coil?"

Amber decided to try explaining again. "I found him at Red Base when we were trying to capture that giant gun thing. I was going to use him as ammo, but then he started talking."

"Okay," said Hester while alternating looks between Clair and Vincent, confused disbelief still clearly her dominant emotion. "Continue, Private Stone."

"Anyways, this coil introduced itself to me as Vincent, and then we talked for a bit about certain things, like how he thinks humans suck and some other subjects I didn't care to remember. To get to the point, we became kind of friends. Sort of. "

"Um, but didn't you just say that Vincent thought humans sucked?" Skope asked. "So how did someone who hates humanity manage to become friends with one?"

Amber shook her head. "No no, it's not like that. He had very…strong opinions about some things, including humanity, but when we started really debating the whole thing he proved to have a very deep personality, and I think I kind of took to him a bit. Not in a romantic way by any stretch of the imagination, just in a 'talk with friends' kind of way. And it was nice to talk to someone who I didn't spend all day with or was trying to kill me." Amber shrugged.

"It…he…was found on enemy territory, admitted to hating humanity, and what did you do?" Ryan asked rhetorically. "You let him into our base, and now the next thing you know he's led an attack force that nearly resulted in our Army _losing its command base_. Great job!"

"Well, it was a fusion coil!" Amber protested sternly. "How the hell was I supposed to know that all of this was gonna happen because of it?"

"Can it, both of you!" Patton barked. "We'll figure this out later!"

Jess took out her pistol. "Well, it's the leader of the Red Army, and it's also a fusion coil. Why don't we just shoot it and call this whole thing done with?" She aimed.

Nome began reaching for Jess's arm. "You should be aware that Vincent almost certainly became the leader of the Red Army for a reason. I do not believe that is a good idea-"

He wasn't fast enough to stop Jess from pulling the trigger, however.

The pistol's bullet sped towards Vincent, but suddenly slowed and stopped in midair, then reversed direction and accelerated...

Towards Jess. The communications specialist ducked just in time, and the bullet she had fired flew a centimeter above the top of her helmet. "Shit!"

Vincent began to laugh. Everyone was slightly surprised at the sound it made, not only because it was the first time anyone had heard a fusion coil laugh, but also because it sounded astonishingly similar to human's laugh.

"Humans! Your arrogance knows so _few_ limits. To think that being a fusion coil might be a liability towards my survivability? I beg to differ. In fact, it is because I am a fusion coil that I have been given the powers I now possess, to use against you helpless bipeds!"

"Given to you by whom?" Nome asked the fusion coil, interrupting its speech.

"What?" Vincent asked the medic, sounding slightly annoyed.

"Who gave you these powers?" Nome asked again forcefully. "You said 'I have been given the powers I now possess'. So who is responsible for doing that?"

"Uhhhh, not important," Vincent sternly replied, though he didn't exactly sound very convinced of this.

"It damn sure sounds important," Hester countered.

"Agreed." Patton noted

"Shut up, stupid humans!" Vincent verbally bit back. "I am the one controlling conversation here. It was interesting listening to all of you talk about me because your "thoughts" were amusing. But now I've had about enough of such prattle. I allowed all of you to enter this room because you are the soldiers who have been the greatest thorn in my side, metaphorically speaking, since the Red Army began, and the reason I let you live long enough to enter my presence is so that I can kill all of you _personally_."

"Actually, I think the reason we got this far is because Brain's OLAV pod crashed into the station, and the decompression sucked your entire attack force out into space because they were dumb enough to all gather in one place," Ryan countered.

"Oh, is _that_ what happened?" Brian asked. "All I remember is getting stuck in that pod, seeing space, screaming at the top of my lungs for a few minutes, then hearing another giant crash, and then I was staring at all of you guys again. I had no idea that _I_ was the reason the Red soldiers disappeared. Did they really all go into space? I would've wanted to see that!"

"Seriously?" Amber asked the former Blue. "What does it take for you to get with the program?"

"I also met this interesting dude while I was in space too," Brian continued, unfazed by Amber's comment.

"That's great, Brian," Vincent shouted at the former Blue sarcastically. "Now silence yourself."

"It was a round white ball-thing with this huge yellow eye," Brian continued, ignoring Vincent entirely. "Oh, and it had handles on it."

"Was it about this big?" Skope asked Brian while approximating with his hands about how long the diameter of Master Chief was.

Brian shook his head. "No, it was smaller, like this big." He spaced his hands to about two thirds the spacing of Skope's hands.

"And you say it had _handles_ on it?" Nome asked.

Brian nodded. "Yeah, nice big handles on both sides."

Nome shook his head to the other Greens, confirming that what Brian was describing could not possibly be Master Chief.

Brian continued: "When I flew close to it, it shouted at me 'I'm in space' and I shouted back 'yeah, so am I' and he shouted back 'dude I'm in space' and I shouted back 'yeah, it's so awesome' and he shouted back 'dude, I'm in _space!_ ' and I shouted back-"

" _Shut up, you puny, insignificant humans!"_ Vincent exclaimed.

"Yeah, don't think so," Patton said as he turned his attention to the fusion coil. "Now what did you do with my brother and the rest of Lemon? _I'm_ not done with _you_ , fusion coil."

"I put them in a place where they can watch you die," said Vincent. "Look up."

Everyone looked at the ceiling and gasped. Floating helplessly at the very top of the room were a dozen Yellow soldiers, one of whom Patton instantly recognized as Bradley by his distinctive armor. Additionally, he could see Tom, Deryn, and Wren as well, the latter of which had lost her helmet. Without it, Patton could easily see the resemblance between her and her older sister Hester.

They were simply drifting on the ceiling rafters, as though they were balloon animals. Though they were unmoving, their armor readings indicated that they were alive, just out cold.

"Hang on, bro!" he shouted up at Bradley. "I'll take care of the fusion coil."

"I am sure that you will try, _puny human_ ," Vincent shouted. "But you will FAIL!"

Suddenly the room began to vibrate violently. The Greens and Yellows (except for Lemon and Patton) stumbled, trying to maintain their balance. There was a sound of tearing metal from all sides of the room, and giant spikes flashing with electrical sparks protruded from the walls. The lights darkened, making the only source of illumination the windows looking over the planet.

 _The room is turning into the same setup as the portal chamber in Red Base,_ Skope realized. He turned to call out to Nome to let him know, but he could tell from the medic's observant manor that he already knew.

Nome nodded at Skope and stumbled over to him. "The fusion coil is attempting to open a gateway to the other universe," he stated. "An outcome that cannot possibly be good. We need to stop it."

"You got a plan?" he asked. Nome shook his head.

"Not yet. Stall the coil. I will think of something."

Skope looked over at Vincent, and found that the coil was looking directly at him. Skope did his best to approach Vincent, though the shaking of the room made this effort considerably difficult. "Why are you doing all of this?" he shouted at Vincent.

" _Christopher Skope,_ " Vincent replied with a tone of abject hatred that caused everyone, in surprise, to shift their focus to the fusion coil and sent a surge of cold down Skope's spine. "You want to know why I'm doing all of this? Why I started this Army? Why I initiated that whole other war on the other side of the planet? And why I must d _estroy_ the universe? Do you really want to know why? It's because of you! You, Skope, because of what you did! Ahahaha!"

Skope stared in disbelief. "HUH? This is MY fault?"

"Figures." Amber noted, the immediate danger not diminishing her dislike of Skope at all.

"We were happy, living like we did in our pile in the canyon," Vincent continued to explain. "We knew little of evil, and wanted for nothing. But then you came along, with your sniper rifle, thinking that we fusion coils were nothing but inanimate objects, and you took from me the only family I had ever known! You blew it all up! What, oh, don't look at me as if you have no idea what I'm talking about."

Skope continued to stare at Vincent, as did everyone else in the room. Even Nome, though he obviously wasn't truly looking.

"Are you fucking serious?" Vincent shouted. "You really don't remember destroying my family? Think back, you insensitive prick. Think back to when there was a migration of my people to the canyon, just over five days ago. Hundreds of us were respawned to the canyon just outside of your base entrance structure, and you had fun sniping all of us, innocent people, because you're a sadistic bastard!"

Skope continued to stare at Vincent for a few more seconds, before suddenly saying lamely: "Oh, that."

"'Oh, what,' exactly?" Patton demanded for Skope to explain.

"About five days ago, there was this giant appearance of piles of fusion coils in the canyon, which seemed to just appear out of nowhere. Me and the commander would use them for target practice."

"Like the one near our base." Patton ruminated.

"Yeah, the one that let Amber put a cap up your ass!" Ryan shouted at Skope.

"AND IT WAS ALL YOUR FAULT!" Vincent shouted so loudly that it made everyone jump.

By now, the spikes growing out of all of the bridge's non-window walls had reached their full sizes (judging from the fact that their growth rate was slowing down), and with that as the only warning, a swarm of several swirling lights suddenly appeared in the middle of the room, in front of the holographic console. The Greens recognized the lights immediately.

"A portal is about to open!" Nome shouted. "Get back!"

"SKOPE!" Vincent shouted with his maintained hatred of the Green sniper. "I am going to take you and your companions to a special place where I shall rid existence of you. There, I will reveal to you my plans for this fetid universe, and you will all die knowing that the rest of the world you leave behind will follow you in your fate! Ahahaha!"

The swirling balls of light coalesced into one large sphere, which then grew in size. It was the same thing that the Greens had seen when they were escaping the Swirling Abyss of Absentmindedness, only more slowly, since this time Nome hadn't fired upon the sphere with his pistol to accelerate its growth."

"Wherever Vincent's taking us, it can't possibly be good," Skope stated. He was staring at the ground. "And it's all because of me."

The other Greens walked up to him. Nome put a hand on his shoulder. "Defeat Vincent we must. If it happens on his own ground, then so be it. We _will_ do this."

The Yellows also walked up to Skope. "I don't give a rats ass if it has telekinesis," Patton stated. "The commander of your army gave you a mission. Well, ours did too." He glanced up at Bradley and the other half of Lemon for a second, then looked back down at Skope. "That bastard is going to pay for what he's done. We're all in this together now, to whatever end."

"To whatever end," everyone repeated, more or less in unison.

Vincent's laughter increased in intensity as the portal consumed the center of the bridge, taking him, the Greens, and the Yellows with it.


	34. FINAL INTENTIONS

The Greens and Yellows reappeared on the shores of an island, several meters above the ground. One second, a crash, and a few groans later, those that were able to without being blocked by one of their allies looked up to take in their surroundings. The island they were standing on was about the same shape and size of the land mass containing Nome's original base and weapons testing facility back in the Halothrii Wilderness. Just like that island, this one had a mountainous peak at its center, which came to dominate the center of the island as it rose up. However, this island was covered almost entirely by jagged blocks of durasteel which littered the island's surface, creating a whole new layer of metal over the existing natural rock. And on the mountain itself they could see that durasteel wasn't just on landscapes surface; it was inside the mountain as well. Walkways and windows could be seen staring back at them, a sure sign that the mountain's interior had been hollowed out and served as a base of some kind. To add to the ominousness of the scene, the sky was a luminous red color, much like the color of the armor of Red soldiers, casting the entire island and everything on it in a bloody hue and throwing dizzying shadows across much of the surface.

But the most interesting thing was none of this. The thing that really caught the Greens and Yellows attentions was a giant structure, shaped like a hand pointing at something with its index finger hovering above the island, just over the peak of the mountain. It really was absolutely massive; larger than the island itself by some magnitude. The Greens and Yellows gaped at the giant hand in awe. The only larger non-grounded construct any of them had seen before was Yellow Command, and the size of the hand was obviously enough to rival even that.

At the tip of the extended index finger were more swirling multi-colored lights, which circled energetically around the finger's tip with a barely audible sizzling noise.

The Greens and Yellows stared at everything for a few moments, when suddenly Nome exclaimed: "Oh, no."

"What is it?" Skope asked, still gawking at the sights. "I mean, aside from a giant metal hand, of course."

"I know what the fusion coil is trying to do," Nome replied slowly.

"You _do_?" Patton said, turning to face the medic. "Well then please, share it with the rest of us."

Nome pointed at the tip of the extended finger of the durasteel hand and the swirling colors of light. " _That_ is a quantum fluctuating destabilizer, and can be used to fracture the fabric of space-time that borders a universe."

"I understood everything you just said," Brian commented.

" _Really?"_ Everyone else except Nome shouted.

Brian nodded. "Yeah, except for…wait…never mind. I'm not sure I really understood it after all. I think he lost me at the word 'that'".

"Allow me to reverse my steps," said Nome. "According to dominant hyperspace theory, the multiverse consists of many universes floating in a medium that separates them, which is hyperspace. Or slipspace. Or whatever you wish to call it. The universes move relative to each other are sort of like bubbles in a bubble bath, with the bubbles themselves being individual universes, the water being hyperspace, and the surfaces of the bubbles being the fabric of space-time that borders that universe. If this fabric is broken, then in theory, just like a bubble, a universe would "pop" and cease to exist. This has never been tested, of course."

"Is that so?" said Patton, minimally convinced. "Are you saying that the fusion coil is trying to _pop the fucking universe_?"

Nome nodded. "Given what we have seen, it would seem so, yes." He then took another look up at the durasteel finger. "Given the design of Vincent's contraption, however, I might rephrase that it is trying to _poke_ the universe. Actually popping the universe would take an astronomical amount of power, but poking it would cause a chain reaction of destruction that would do the job just as well."

"You are smarter then you look, Green!" a familiar voice shouted off to the side of them. They turned to find Vincent, who had clearly been listening to their conversation since it began, floating several meters away from them.

Skope stepped forward. "Vincent, are you really doing all of this just because you're angry at me? Popping the universe? Doesn't that seem just a bit over the top?"

"Not to mention ridiculously stupid…" Ryan muttered.

Vincent laughed, his luminescent sides flashing in sync to his reverberating tone. " _Christopher Skope_ , you amuse me to little end. I must say, before I met you I expected you to be cruel in nature and merciless in disposition. Needless to say, you've recently disproven both of those impressions. To a certain extent, anyway. But none the less I must destroy you. I have been promised- no, wait. Let me start that sentence over."

He performed some version of clearing his throat (as much as a fusion coil could, since he didn't have a throat, or lungs to clear it with) then began again. "Upon the glorious day when I activate this hand of doom and destroy your universe, I shall have it remade, and all human life within will be replaced by _fusion coils!_ There will be no genocidal humans to ruin fusion coil families and end their lives meaninglessly, as you have done. No more humans to destroy fusion coil youth just so that they can power up odd machinery, or provide light, or whatever the hell it is you use us for."

"Batteries," Hester answered. "FYI."

"My point exactly!" exclaimed Vincent. "Your crimes will soon end. And I will be the one to ensure that it does! For eons after the universe is destroyed and reborn, I will be the one who will be remembered for ending human genocide and tyranny! My name will transcend all of time!"

His boast somehow echoed as he finished, giving the claim a sinister turn.

"This would be super funny," Ryan yawned, "if it didn't appear to be so true. Still is damn stupid sounding, though."

Vincent growled at the Yellow weapons specialist, a sound that was particularly interesting when coming from a fusion coil.

"What does it take? Have you so little feeling in your souls? I show you the method by which all you know will end, and you _yawn!_ No, that is wrong. You were supposed to be fearful and grovel and beg and say 'no Vincent, please don't destroy our universe'. You were supposed to be helpless in front of me and I would laugh. So why are you not doing that? I threaten the very existence of your _universe_ and it doesn't work! What the hell is wrong with you people?"

Ryan yawned again and said: "The reason we're not scared and stuff? Aside from the fact that I've seen more inventive 'end of the universe' plans in bad fanfiction? Because we're hearing all of this from a fusion coil. Doesn't matter if it's our three day weekend off, or our pension, or even our universe. It's just so damn hard to take you seriously when you're a fusion coil. Sorry." He yawned a third time. "Shit. I really should get more sleep."

Vincent let out the loudest growl yet. "Auuuuugh, you insensitive pricks! No more talking. Now you die!"

Without warning a giant block appeared from nowhere and went hurtling at the Yellows and Greens. They just barely managed to dodge, and the block impacted in the spot where they'd been standing, carving out a deep gash in the earth as it slid along the ground.

"That is the reason we take this seriously!" Hester shouted at Ryan. "Because Vincent has the same powers as Master Chief…and is not afraid to use them!"

More blocks appeared out of thin air and flew at the Yellows and Greens. Again they dodged, but as one of the blocks sailed past the elusive soldiers it hit a shimmering something in the air which vanished a second later. This strange phenomenon was at the shore, and several meters above the ground…about the same place the Greens and Yellows had arrived at when they first jumped into this place. Nome pointed at the approximate place of the phenomenon. "Everyone, look over there! I saw a spatial distortion when a block neared it. I believe that the same curvature of space-time that Vincent used to teleport us here is still present. We may be able to escape through it!"

"Later!" Patton shouted back. "We gotta take out that hand first!"

"Yes, of course!" Nome replied. "It is a threat to the existence of the universe, and must be neutralized. But how best to go about doing so..." He paused (as much as was possible with giant chunks of metal flying at him), studying the hand for weak points.

"We need to give the medic some time! Yellow Team, ATTACK!" Hester shouted. The other Yellow's replied with a battle cry and charged.

"Fools!" Vincent cackled, throwing another metal plate at them. Most of the Yellow's dodged it, but Amber was caught by a corner and sent sliding almost clean off the mountain. Hearts grabbed her before she could fall to her death.

Patton, Ryan, Hester, Inez, and Clair all retaliated, firing their weapons simultaneously. Vincent easily deflected everything thrown at him, but the metal plates stopped coming.

"Keep up the fire!" Patton ordered. "He can't save himself and attack us at the same time!"

The Yellows did so. From behind them, Nome made a contented noise.

"I have it!" He exclaimed. "We need to disable the Quantum Foam Harmonic Power Supply!"

"Repeat that in English please?" Kenny asked.

"Hit the wrist!" Nome shouted back.

Everyone in the area glanced up; it was easy enough to see what Nome was talking about. Around where the wrist of the hand was, there sat several large, orange tanks, like the ones that held fuel back in the group's own universe.

 _This is all my fault,_ Skope thought to himself. _I have to fix this! Destroy the hand, by any means necessary._ Without hesitation, he hauled out his sniper rifle and fired, not even bothering to aim.

The round flew straight and true, right into the wrist. There was a pause, then a massive explosion that sent charred metal in a halo around the wrist. The front part of the hand tipped down, finger no longer pointing at the sky or glowing.

"Success!" Nome exclaimed.

"My Hand! You pricks! You broke my Hand!" Vincent exclaimed. Then he saw the Greens and Yellows were running like hell for the distortion. "Stop, damn you!"

A slab of durasteel the size of a Scorpion-Class Tank landed between the soldiers and the distortion. They hastily scrambled around it, but then came to face the real problem.

"How the hell do we reach the portal?" Hearts shouted. "It's at least five meters above us."

Inez responded to that by using her robotic arm to drag over a durasteel block and shove it under the distortion. Then she found another, smaller one and set it atop the first one to make a kind of pyramid that everyone could use as a staircase. They hadn't been able to see the distortion since the block went past it, but sure enough it was there, because when Hester reached the top block and put her hand above her head, it seemed to vanish into thin air, and around her arm appeared the same wispy shimmering that they had seen before.

Skope looked around, Vincent being the subject on his mind. Escaping he may be, but the fact that his actions had been the soul motivation for Vincent wreck the havoc he had made Skope feel slightly regretful that he wasn't able to resolve the situation. But then again, what else could he do now? They didn't have any kind of weapon that could harm Vincent; on the bridge, the fusion coil had demonstrated that anything sent in its direction would just get reflected back via its telekinesis powers. And he'd done the exact same thing moments before, with the Yellows. All that they could have done was disable the hand, and he'd done that already.

And thinking of that vengeful fusion coil, where was it? Ever since they got past the durasteel slab it had put in their path, they hadn't seen or heard it do anything-

Everyone looked up to find a bright orange ball about the diameter of the Yellow's base entrance structure hovering in the air, next to Vincent. The fusion coil used his telekinesis to twirl the ball about, building up momentum. As it did so, the surface of the ball touched the tips of some of the durasteel blocks lining the island, and upon contact they turned red hot. _Plasma in a force field,_ everyone simultaneously realized.

As he continued to swing the ball, Vincent shouted: "I haven't even gotten you to beg yet, dammit!" He paused, then added, "Fuck, I can't remember how to close the portal with mental powers. That just leaves taking it out with a kill ball!"

Vincent flew towards the soldiers, kill ball close behind.

Everyone scrambled towards the teleporter. Lemon got in first, Inez having been the one who set the blocks to reach it in the first place. Meanwhile, Vincent continued to laugh maniacally as he swung the kill ball like a flashy pendulum, each swing bringing the kill ball perilously closer to the teleporter then the last. Grass ignited as it passed over, leaving a charred path behind it. The Greens went into the teleporter next. At this point, the kill ball was just bare meters from the hovering portal. The remaining Yellows took their final chance of escape. The last person, Patton, made it through the shimmering distortion just before the kill ball reached it.

Everyone hit the ground of Yellow Command's bridge as the portal exploded behind them a second later. The instant the portal was gone, it was as though a switch was flipped. Everyone who had been floating on the ceiling of the bridge went crashing to the ground to join the Yellows and Greens. At the same time, the giant electrified spikes in the walls fizzled and retracted back into nonexistence, though the huge holes they had carved remained.

Kenny joined a chorus of groans as he tried to pull himself up from the floor. "I hope this 'leap through a portal to escape instantaneous death' thing doesn't become a trend or something. 'cause we've done that _way_ too many times in the last few days."

"I hope so too," said Skope, wincing as he picked himself up. "Considering all the weird shit that's been happening though, I wouldn't count on it. Especially with that fusion coil angry at us."

"Angry at you, you mean," Kenny retorted.

"Yeah, at me," said Skope. "Fucking hell."

"Bro?" Patton called out. A groan was the response he got. He rushed over to where the familiar sounding utterance came from and found Bradley sitting up on the floor near the holographic console, trying to wake up his legs. Deryn was next to him, checking him over for any serious injury. Tom and Wren were apparently still in one piece as well, with the latter being checked out by Hester.

"I'm fine, bro," the Lord High Commander General responded, waving Deryn off. "Just gotta get my circulation back. I don't want to know how long I was floating up there. Weirdest damn afternoon I've ever had, let me tell you."

"Oh, you think _you've_ had a weird afternoon?" Patton countered. "Let me tell _you…_ "

While he and Bradley began hashing back and forth all the things that had happened to them in the last few hours, Skope approached Nome to discuss his own thoughts, since Nome was probably the only person he could seriously and in-depthly talk about all of this with. "Looks like everything's gone back to normal, huh?" he decided to start the conversation with.

Nome nodded. "Vincent's telekinetic influence over this station appears to have been cut off the instant the portal was destroyed. Yes, things do seem to have gone back to normal…for now, at least."

"Do you really think that my blowing up of his pile is the sole reason he's doing all of this?" Skope asked, now getting to the subject he'd really been meaning to talk about.

"That is what the fusion coil says," postulated Nome. "However, as with many things, I believe that there is far more to this that we, and possibly Vincent himself, currently know. He mentioned that someone or something else gave him the powers he currently possesses, and I am inclined to believe that there is someone else even further behind all of this. Vincent is much too emotionally compromised to truly be capable of the manipulation and string pulling we've seen from the Reds thus far."

"And he's also a fusion coil," said Skope.

"Yes," Nome agreed. "That too."

"So Vincent is still out there, as well as the person controlling him," said Skope. "Sounds like we have a lot of work to do."

"Indeed," said Nome. "But do not burden yourself too greatly with the blame that Vincent placed upon you, for Vincent is clearly but another pawn in an even larger game."

"And one way or another," said Hester, who was approaching them, Wren in tow behind her, "we'll deal the full tiered ladder of assholes who are responsible for this. But as for now-" She holstered her assault rifle. "I'm fucking hungry. I'm heading down to the mess hall, get something to eat."

"Hmm." Nome said. "Actually, unless you have any particular complaints, I believe I will join you."

"Same." Jess noted.

"Ditto." Added Kenny.

"Sure, what the hell. I'll come too." Skope agreed.

Hester shrugged. "Whatever."

"Don't show off to much of the station," Patton warned her.

"We won't," Hester replied to Patton. "It's just that there are far more important places for Greens to get their hands on then the mess hall." She turned back to the Greens. "Now come on."

Nearly everyone followed behind her, except for about half a dozen members of the cleanup crew who were looking around the bridge and realizing how much work they would have to do.


	35. DESPERATE TIMES, DESPERATE MEASURES

The Greens were allowed an extremely quick meal in Yellow Command's mess hall, and then hurriedly sent back through the teleporter to the Halothrii Wilderness before they could see any more of the station then they already had during the battle.

It may not have been fully justified, given the amount of help the Greens had given the Yellows during the Red's attempted siege of the station and what followed after, but Bradley felt it nevertheless important that classified reveals be kept at a minimum for just in case relations between the Green and Yellow armies deteriorated at some point in the future. Nome protested that they'd already seen the bridge and several other important sections of the station, and verbally wondered what Bradley could possibly want to keep a secret that had not already been seen by them.

But Bradley was insistent, and considering that they were on a station filled with Yellows (most of whom were still jacked up from the fight against the Reds and obviously not feeling generous or merciful), the Greens had little room for further argument. They went single file through the teleporter, and ended up on the other end, in the Wilderness near a now ruined base that the Blues used to occupy days before.

"Well that kinda sucked," said Kenny, absentmindedly chewing on the remains of a pastry. "We help them kill the Reds, and then help them fight Vincent, and then they're like 'okay, you've seen enough of the station, time to go back to your base.' Assholes."

"Big surprise, really," Skope muttered sarcastically. "They ARE Yellows, remember."

"Well, at least we're done up there," said Kevin. "We've completed the mission the Grand General assigned to us. It's over." He let out a relieved sigh.

"Over in one sense, perhaps," said Nome. "However, when we take into consideration that the universe's continued existence is now in jeopardy due to the efforts of the Red Army's leader. From that position, the situation would appear to have only begun."

The others noted that Nome had purposefully neglected to refer to Vincent by his name, perhaps because he was still in the process of accepting that the source of all their recent trouble was a fusion coil.

"Let's just get back to base," said Skope. "I need some R and R. Just…to be alone for awhile."

"You okay?" Jess asked the sniper.

Skope nodded. "Yeah, sure," he lied.

He wasn't okay. Not by long shot. He needed to think to himself about the fact that Vincent was doing all of this because Skope had sniped the fusion coil's pile. As stupid as the reason sounded, it still made him in a large way responsible for the peril that the known universe was in. He wanted to believe it was a mistake or something, but Vincent had managed to refer to him by name during the confrontation on Yellow Command's bridge, which could only imply that it was true: Skope had fucked up in the worst way possible.

The Greens jogged back across the canyon to their base entrance structure. When they reached the elevator to go down into the base, they discovered that the elevator's call pad and control panel had been broken. The casing was laying across the walkway in two pieces, and wires were strewn out of the conduit's wall like thick strands of multi-colored hair.

"Oh yeah, the Reds mentioned they attacked the canyon while we were at Yellow Command," Kenny suddenly remembered.

Jess rushed over to the dissected control pad and took some of the wires into her hands, observing them. She then let out a relieved sigh and put the ends of two of the wires, both a dark blue color, together. There was a quick burst of sparks from the wires, and the elevator's call tone sounded.

"It doesn't look like they were able to get into the elevator shaft," Jess then explained. "When the Reds came here, they didn't have the codes, because they had been sent to invade the Yellow base in this canyon but not the Green one. They must have tried to manually override the elevator, but it didn't work. They couldn't get in. Looks like we're in the green, both politically and metaphorically speaking."

"That's good news if I ever heard it!" Kevin exclaimed as the elevator finally came and everyone stepped into the car.

"Hope the Yellows had it worse than us," he muttered sourly.

* * *

"FUUUUUUUCK!" Patton bellowed after gazing upon the insides of their base. The steel door that had until recently protected the base from unwelcome entry had been literally annihilated, and solidified droplets of metal now coated the entrance hallway. The Reds had clearly used a high power laser to burn through the door. Near where the molten steel had splashed, scorch marks covered the walls, coating the entire corridor in the unbecoming color of char and ash.

Patton and the other seven inhabitants of the base rushed in hastily to see what else the Reds had done besides destroy their door. They were relieved to find that none of their quarters had much out of place. The locks on all of the rooms were now busted from forceful entry, everyone had some ammo missing, and someone had rearranged Ryan's book collection in reverse alphabetical order, but aside from that there wasn't so much to worry about.

Ryan feared initially that the experimental weapons had been stolen, but upon inspection of his room he discovered that the weapon's he'd left behind had been so cleverly hidden (in a compartment below a floor panel below another floor panel below a _third_ floor panel under a carpet under a couch on the floor of his room) that the Reds had fortunately managed to overlook them. They hadn't even gotten close.

Relieved, Ryan also pulled out his personal laptop (which was thankfully untouched as well, having been in the same place as the experimental weapons) and checked the views for the video he'd uploaded to YellowTube of the Green taking off his armor in front of the base entrance structure just over a day earlier.

"Holy shit!" he called out in shock. The others soon joined him in his quarters in a stampede of boots and a near-collision between Clair and Inez.

"What's the emergency?" Clair asked.

"Um, there's not one," said Ryan. "Our YellowTube just broke half a million views."

"Seriously?" Amber exclaimed. "Hot damn!"

Everyone looked over Ryan's shoulder to find that, sure enough, the video had accumulated 531,441 views. Ryan refreshed the page, and the number jumped by 25.

"Holy crap you're right." Clair said, astonished.

"This...is...AWESOME." Amber added gleefully.

"Is this what I missed just before arriving at this base?" Hearts asked while watching the actual content of the video, instead of just its quantity of views. "Looks awesome."

Patton nodded sadly. "Yeah, it is. But we can all watch this later. Now c'mon, people. We've gotta check out the rest of the base first. If the Reds did ANYTHING, I want to know.

The others were reluctant to leave the video, but recognizing necessity they all followed Patton out of Ryan's quarters and down the hallway, towards the kitchen.

The major thing worthy of notice to the members of Yellow Base (Lemon Squadron more specifically) was that the Reds had apparently gone on a fake lemonade binge and had somewhat of a party in the kitchen, using up the last of the "carbonated piss" in the process, as well as a considerable amount of the other food supplies, the trash of which they had left around the room. This caused stifled anger, but no more than that, since the food supply problem could easily be solved with a call to Yellow Command later about sending down replacements for what had been eaten.

Next on the sweep of the base was the motor pool. The vehicles there had been tampered with, but thankfully not taken. The reason for this, undoubtedly, was that the Reds had been planning on taking Yellow Command at the time, and since the cramped corridors of a space station weren't very welcoming of bulky vehicles, the Reds would have decided unnecessary the idea of stealing them. They probably even thought they could take the vehicles when they came back later after taking Yellow Command.

 _But of course, my team and I stopped that from happening,_ Patton thought to himself silently and proudly. _Suck on that, dipshits_.

Lastly was to investigate the thing everyone knew had been taken, as Steve had proved on Yellow Command when he had explained his not-so-original setup for keeping the Yellows and Greens in shield wall cages. Their trip down to the holding cells yielded no surprise: the Purple spy, Travis Chamealon, was nowhere to be seen. He had been taken by the Reds.

"Don't care about a motor pool's worth of high quality vehicles," Hester commented as she gazed at the Purple's now empty cell. "But like any respectable Army, you just can't pass up a prisoner."

"Big surprise." Inez noted blandly. "Pity. I wanted to ask him more questions."

"We're still pretty damn fortunate the Reds didn't take more," said Hearts. "It's a good thing they had a schedule to keep on Command. If they'd had more time, they probably would have cleared us out."

"Yes, fortunate we are," said Hester. "And the Reds won't be so fortunate to enter our base again. We have a bit of repairing to do…and I have a booby trap or two in mind to add."

"As do I." Inez agreed.

Patton nodded. "Sounds like a good idea…and maybe a little fun. Kills two birds with one stone; stops the Reds from getting in, and makes them suffer too."

Hester nodded to him, then turned and headed up stairs to begin repairs on the base, followed by the rest of Lemon.

That was when Patton's COM started flashing. He answered it.

"Hey bro, short time no see. Yeah, I've got some time. Hmmm…yes, I suppose it does call for some desperate measures…but are you sure? I mean, really? Yeah, I guess you're right. It worked well enough when they were on the station. Well, I'm still a little iffy, but if you're for it, bro, then so am I. Just give me the order and I'll do it."

* * *

Skope stood on the veranda of the Green's base entrance structure, staring out at the rest of the canyon through the scope of his sniper rifle. Five days ago, when he had sniped Vincent's pile (that had been the one with that lone fusion coil off to the side, must've been) he'd been standing just like this. Staring straight out into the canyon, the Green Commander standing behind him and lecturing about the war and armor and things…

And then Skope realized that in the five eventful days since this memory, no one had bothered to give the Commander a proper funeral. He had been buried the evening of the same day he'd been sniped, but because of everything else that had happened, they'd never gotten around to a ceremony or anything. They just stuck him in the ground and shoved some dirt over him. Skope admitted to slight guilt over this, but right now wasn't the time either. He had to think. Plan.

This was where he'd been standing when he'd unknowingly put the universe in jeopardy. Vincent's pile had been destroyed, and this had somehow set the angry fusion coil on a path of vengeance. Though in that regard, it wasn't all Skope's doing. After all, the fusion coil was the one behind the Red Army. Skope hadn't even realized there _was_ a Red Army until more than two days after he had sniped Vincent's pile. And it had obviously been in the works for a while before that. So in that respect, he wouldn't be entirely responsible if the universe was destroyed. Just partly responsible. Not that it made him feel any better.

His thoughts were interrupted by the pinging of his COM. It was Jess, calling over the direct communications frequency.

"Someone's coming through the communications tower teleporter from Centerpoint City. Oh my God, it's-"

After a pause she finished, this time on TEAMCOM: "Everyone. COM tower teleporter. Now! Double time."

It was very unusual for Jess to get bossy, which meant that whatever this was about had to be damn important. Skope slung his rifle onto his back and jogged over to the communications tower. He joined Kenny, Kevin, Mr. Boom, and Nome as they went single file through the door.

Inside they found Jess, standing next to the active teleporter, and next to her stood-

"Holy shit, it's the Grand General!" Kenny exclaimed. Then he gasped. "Oh, I mean…Sir!" He gave a salute. The rest of the Greens followed suit.

Kevin stood in the doorway stunned, for he had only heard mention of his team meeting the Grand General before. "Your…your Grandness, it is a pleasure to meet you!" he babbled out.

"You would be Kevin Guinness, would you not?" the Grand General responded pleasantly. "Your communications expert informed me of your return when she spoke to me over the COM, a few hours ago."

Kevin nodded enthusiastically. "Yessir, that's my name."

Inside his head, he thought _The Grand General knows my name! Oh my God!_

"Indeed we have already informed you of the results of our mission over COMs," Nome stated. "If my may ask, sir, why are you here? Surely we completed the mission you assigned us."

The Grand General gave a gentle nod. "Yes, about that. It would seem that the results of your mission have carried over far beyond simply helping the Yellows survive. In light of the fact that the joint operation between you and the Yellows worked as well as it did, and also that the universe is in danger by the leader of the Reds, we have decided to form an indefinite truce between our Armies, at least until this Vincent is apprehended or destroyed."

The Greens stared dumbfounded at the Grand General. It was enough that the Grand General had come to their base in person, but the second part of the news was so much that they had trouble believing that they had heard correctly.

It was Jess who broke the silence a few moments later. "Um, sir, did you just say 'a truce between our Armies?' As in, a truce with the Yellows?"

The Grand General nodded. "Yes, that is correct. Please don't act like it's such a shock. After all, early on in the war's history, truces like this were quite common. The Yellows themselves had one with the Blues in order to defeat the Oranges, who were then a threat to all Armies. The Blues actually helped them build their Command. That truce no longer exists, because the Oranges are long gone. Or at least they were until recently. But my point is this: indefinite truces have happened before, and considering that the Reds have somehow gained the power to throw the known universe in jeopardy, if there is any time for us to strike a truce, it is now, beyond a shadow of a doubt. Vincent is a threat to everything we know and love…because the universe _is_ everything, and he wants to pop it in the name of vengeance; and so, for the sake of reality, we must join forces to stop him."

The Greens gave subtle nods, taking it all in.

"Which is why I have arranged for the highest ranked representative of the Yellow Army who is currently near this planet, Bradley Patton, to meet all of us here, in the middle of this canyon, to discuss in person the best method for defeating the Reds."

The Greens again just stared at the Grand General. An _in person_ meeting between the leaders of two armies over a proposed truce; This had never happened in the history of the war, much less in the history of the Green Army, and that fact underscored exactly how much of a threat the Grand General and Bradley Patton viewed Vincent and the Reds.

"Yessir," as all Skope could think of as a response.

The Grand General continued: "We have both decided on what we believe to be an effective operation to defeat Vincent. But we shall discuss this in the middle of the canyon, when we have convened with the Yellow's Lord High Commander General." He then muttered under his breath, "Now that's a title I'd like, very long and very prestigious."

The Grand General enjoyed that thought for a second, then briskly strode towards the door leading outside. "Follow me, soldiers. Time to meet up with the Yellows."

" _Again,_ " Kevin quietly exclaimed. Everyone ignored him

The Greens, the Grand General, and his escort of elite guard (who came through the teleporter after him) got into some Warthogs and headed for the middle of the canyon. As the Grand General had stated, they indeed found Bradley Patton there, alongside the same team of Yellows the Greens had fought with only three hours before while on Yellow Command, and days before against the original Reds. The Grand General dismounted his Warthog's passenger seat and stepped slowly towards Bradley, with everyone else watching and holding their breath. Was this truce for real, or was one leader about to end up dead from underhand play?

The Grand General reached out to Bradley…and shook his hand.

"Nice firm grip," the Grand General said. "Good, I like that in a soldier."

"As do I. Good in a leader as well." Bradley replied.

Everyone else exhaled. This was for real.

"Quite a pleasure to meet you in person, Lord High Commander General," The Grand General said.

"Likewise, Grand General." said Bradley. "Now then, have you told your soldiers about our plans to stop the Reds?"

The Grand General shook his head. "I was saving that for this particular occasion. Not every lifetime a convening like this happens. An epic plan for an epic moment."

Bradley nodded. "Yes, of course. My men have already been informed. I'll let you brief yours."

The Grand General nodded and turned to face the Greens. "Before this meeting, the Lord High Commander General and I decided that it would be best to send a team, composed of soldiers from both armies, back into the alternate universe to permanently stop Vincent. Though it may be temporarily disabled, the fusion coil's giant hand device is still in one piece, and we need to destroy it. That team includes these Yellows-" he pointed at Patton, Ryan, Clair, and Amber, then turned back to the Greens. "-and you. "

The Greens were beginning to get a bit tired of staring at their General, so instead Nome decided to say "Mmmmmmmm" while Kevin simply said "Ah" and Mr. Boom mumbled something.

The Grand General continued: "Yes. To honor the truce, and also to get as much manpower as we can, we shall send those four Yellows and two of their fellows, plus all of you, into the alternate universe. The only exception on our side is Mr. Boom, who needs to stay behind and look after that huge bomb, and make sure that it doesn't blow up or something. The Yellows, I believe, will be leaving some of their special operations unit to help out as well."

"Indeed we will." Bradley commented.

Mr. Boom nodded confirmation while the other Greens crossed their arms in thought. Behind them, back at Green Base, the recording of "spiked kittens" sounded throughout the canyon, and still seemed to be enough to keep Happy from getting ecstatic enough to explode.

Skope asked the Grand General: "Sir, when we confronted Vincent, all we were able to do was just run before it killed us. Anything we throw its way gets thrown back with its telekinesis powers. How are we supposed to defeat it?"

"You mentioned in your report that you encountered several other people in the alternate universe who called themselves The Clan of the Caged Watermelon. Perhaps they have an idea for how to kill a telekinetic fusion coil. I realize that this is a long shot, sending in all of you with no real idea for how to accomplish your task. But you all need to remember that just three hours ago you helped the Yellows defend against the most powerful siege they have ever had to face on their Command. If anyone can pull this off, it's your group. You will find a way. You _must_ find a way."

"I also have a question," said Nome. "How exactly will we get back into the alternate universe? The portal the Reds had inside their base was destroyed with a bomb they themselves triggered."

Now it was Bradley's turn to answer a question. "Both of our Armies have known of this other universe. Until recently, all we were able to do was catch flashes of it. Enough for readings, but nothing else. But when we combined what our Armies both knew of the science to open a portal, as well as the information you gave your Grand General from your own trip there and intel recovered from the Red base, we discovered how to make what we _think_ will be a stable portal to the other side."

The Grand General nodded. "We have set up a schematic detailing a design that should work. We will of course need to have it built here, so that both colors of the team can access it, and to ease its protection, should someone attack it from this end."

"I should be able to do that," said Nome. "Before I became a medic for the Green Army, I was able to acquire a Master's degree in theoretical physics. If I have the designs then I should be able to create a physical representation of the schematics, though the help of Master Chief would be useful in doing so."

"Excellent," said the Grand General. He then turned back to face Bradley. "It appears that everything is set, then. The portal will be constructed by tomorrow morning, and then the team will set out."

Patton walked over to Nome. "Yet again I end up cooperating with you instead of trying to kill you." he hissed. "Consider yourself lucky, Medic."

Recognizing that this was Patton's traditional greeting to a member of another Army, Nome replied: "It will be a pleasure working with you again as well, Patton."

Taking a cue from Nome and Patton's interactions, the other Greens and Yellows walked towards each other to get to know each other a little better, since they would very soon be embarking on a joint operation of unknown length. Meanwhile, the Grand General and the Lord High Commander General decided to converse in private, and stepped away from the crowd to talk.

"Never thought I'd see this day coming, I have to admit," said Bradley.

"Times have changed, haven't they?" answered the Grand General. "Not so long ago there were only three Armies. Now there's six. And the universe could end soon. It's almost like a whole different war."

"If it weren't a different war then I would never have agreed to this truce," said Bradley. "But, desperate times, desperate measures."

"Nor I," said the Grand General. Then another thought occurred to him. "This team we've set up may be the last hope for our universe. Maybe even for the alternate universe as well."

"Desperate times indeed," stated Bradley.

CONTINUED IN STAGE 3


End file.
